Big week ahead for Daniel Hillier
Daniel Hillier – file image courtesy of NZ Open
The DP World Tour heads east to Dubai for this week’s DP World Tour Championship at the Earth Course at the Jumeirah Estates, the season-ending event consisting of the leading 50 players in the Race to Dubai rankings after this past weekend’s Abu Dhabi Championship.
Amongst the 50 to be making the 140 kilometre trip are three Australians, Daniel Hillier, Elvis Smylie and Kazuma Kobori, who will complete successful DP World Tour seasons irrespective of where they finish in Dubai.
Wellingtonian Hillier, who heads the group following his impressive 5th-place finish in Abu Dhabi, moves up three places to 17th in the Race to Dubai standings. Smylie is 20th after finishing 32nd last week, and Kobori slips to 41st following his 41st-place finish at the Yas Links course in Abu Dhabi.
All three get to play for this week’s US$10,000 million purse in addition to the US$6 million bonus pool should they play exceptionally well this week.
Hillier’s 5th place finish in Abu Dhabi against such a strong field was full of merit, although, as he had done in India a few weeks ago, he let slip a golden opportunity to win the event or finish higher than his eventual position.
Hillier actually took the lead at 24 under when he produced his 7th birdie of the day at the 11th before a double bogey at the 15th, where he failed to get out of the greenside bunker on the first occasion, and a bogey at the last would cost him dearly.
Still, for the 27-year-old he earns a cheque for €301,000, taking his earnings for the season to more than €1.6 million or $A2.9 million.
Importantly for Hillier, however, is the possibility of gaining one of the ten PGA Tour cards available to the leading ten players in the Race to Dubai rankings and not otherwise exempt in the US, Hillier now standing in 12th position in those specific rankings.
Also with a great chance if he can produce something special in Dubai is Smylie, who stands one position behind Hillier in those rankings after his 32nd place in Abu Dhabi although two late bogeys in round four proved very costly for a number of reasons.
Kobori, who, like Smylie, is playing his first season in Europe, has done well to make it to Dubai and gets his chances at the riches of the season’s final event.
The Abu Dhabi Championship was won by England’s Aaron Rai, who defeated Tommy Fleetwood in a playoff, the pair finishing one ahead of Rory McIlory whose last round of 62 so nearly was enough and Nicolai HØJGAARD.
