Indian golfers have a homecoming wish

GURUGRAM: For Shubhankar Sharma, Yuvraj Singh Sandhu, and Rayhan Thomas, this week’s $2.55 million Indian Open is more than just a homecoming. Despite their different paths, their stories converge on the DLF G&CC’s Gary Player-designed course as they seek a rejuvenating win.

Shubhankar is the seasoned two-time European Tourchampion, Sandhu is the dominant force on the domestic PGTI circuit, and Thomas is the American-schooled prospect who has found his calling on the Korn Ferry Tour for now.




For Shubhankar, the last year was a lesson in the vagaries of the sport. "The bad times are very important for character development," Sharma says, reflecting on a season where he missed 8-9 cuts by a small margin. “It's tough, sometimes nothing goes your way, last year was one of those years. But again, I didn't feel like my game was far away, it was just not clicking. And I was obviously making changes with equipment while traveling from continent to continent. So obviously I didn't keep my card in the end, but I'm very proud that after my last event in Korea, playing 12 out of 13 weeks, I flew all the way to Spain.”

The 29-year-old’s journey back to the European Tour through the trials of Q-School in Spain served as a reminder that “persistence is one of the most important qualities in life.”

This sentiment of resilience is echoed by Yuvraj Singh Sandhu, who enters the week viewing pressure not as a burden, but as a "privilege." For the boy with an army background like his peer Shubhankar, discipline is key. The guilt of a missed workout "eats him up.”

“Definitely as you go to a higher Tour, you have to keep doing what the best in the world are doing. It's just that you have to be much smarter, you have to be conserving energy at the same time. So I think just building on that off the golf course is much more important because that helps you get that work done on the golf course,” said the Chandigarh golfer who won seven times on the PGTI last season, thus topping the Order of Merit and earning a European Tour card.

Rayhan Thomas, fresh from the grind of the PGA Tour’s second-tier Korn Ferry Tour, is ready to take the next step.

“I'd say the Tour teaches you. At least last year when I was a rookie, there were a lot of struggles but I played some good golf too, and I was trying to manage my emotions the whole season. But I've seen a progression compared with last year,” said the 26-year-old who made four out of six cuts, including a Top-25.