Johannes Veerman (-5) holed a putt of barely a metre to save par on the 18th hole at the Gary Player Country Club (Sun City, South Africa) and it’s more than likely he felt his Sunday card of 69 strokes, excellent on this very tough course, might fall a bit short. At best, he might have thought it could be enough to play a playoff for the win at the Nedbank Golf Challenge…
Neither one nor the other. In the end, it was enough for him to win this demanding test of endurance and elimination that the tournament has been, the third event of the European circuit in the 2025 season, as the main contenders gradually fell one by one, ending with the leader at the start of the day, the young South African Aldridge Potgieter (-4), who signed a bogey on the 18th to even miss the playoff option.
The American finally achieves his second victory on the DP World Tour, the confirmation one, in his first appearance of the 2025 season and just a few weeks after closing what had been his most solid campaign on the circuit, 2024, so this success doesn’t catch anyone by surprise. How things are: that season, the last one, he finished in the top 40 of the Race to Dubai and with prize earnings of about 980,000 euros, and now he leads the ranking and accumulates in a single event a bit more than 969,000 euros. Thus, in such a radical way, the landscape can transform with a decisive blow at the right moment.
Potgieter, the massive hitter, had this fourth round under control until a triple bogey on the 12th hole, par 3, opened the doors to a new tournament, with an interesting group of contenders lurking. While Max Homa (PAR), defending champion and favourite at the start of the week, was falling apart, hole by hole, bogey by bogey, others like Matthew Jordan (-4) or Francesco Laporta (-2) found themselves with the great opportunity to inaugurate their record on the DP World Tour, but they were also unable to make a single birdie in the last third of the round, quite the opposite. The Englishman, for example, squandered two excellent chances he had created on holes 16 and 17. He will have to keep waiting. His time has not yet come, although it doesn’t seem far off…
Pablo Larrazábal (+3) was the best-placed Spaniard at the start of this final day. The Barcelona native had the intuition that things were going to happen and that he could have his chance. And he wasn’t very wrong, as the winner, Veerman, started this Sunday on the same numbers, with a total of -2 and five strokes behind the leader… However, things went wrong for the Spaniard quite early, hampered by some poor second shots in the first half of this tricky course, where it’s so difficult to make the correct wind reading and where the flags, or many of them, are excessively devilish.
Jorge Campillo (-1), for his part, was to star in the comeback of the day, signing the best score of this fourth day, a 68 that left him on the brink of the final top ten and within the very small and exclusive group of players who have been able to beat the course in 72 holes. Only thirteen players have managed to do so. The Extremaduran started his round on the 10th hole, holing it from off the green to score the first birdie and hitting a great shot from the fairway of the 11th hole that almost took the ball into the cup. And he ended up squandering an excellent chance on the 9th hole, par 5, missing a putt of about two and a half metres, which could have further improved his spectacular performance. Ángel Hidalgo (+4) and Nacho Elvira (+6), with cards of 75 and 74 strokes respectively, were unable to beat the course on this tough Sunday. Nor could Adrián Otaegui (+3 and a round of 75 strokes) in his competitive debut under the Emirati flag.
