Darren Clarke was right after all - Bristol’s Chris Wood does have what it takes to be a European Tour winner.
A closing 12-foot eagle putt gave Wood a thrilling first victory on the circuit at the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters in Doha.
It came two years after he was four strokes clear with a round to play in Majorca, but shot 76 and handed the title to stablemate Clarke.
“We don’t have to worry about him - he will win and it will be sooner rather than later,” said Clarke, who two months later became Open champion.
Wood, who a year earlier closed with a 76 when leading the BMW PGA Championship, had taken his total of top-10 finishes to 19, including three second places, when he stood on the final tee in Doha on Saturday one behind Sergio Garcia and George Coetzee.
Having led by three at the start of the day, he was in grave danger of suffering more bitter disappointment.
Instead, however, he hit a 300-yard drive into perfect position, a towering six-iron over water to 12 feet and, after looking at the leaderboard for the first time all day, sank the putt.
“It feels amazing - a dream come true,” said the 25-year-old who came fifth in the 2008 Open as an amateur and then a year later missed out on the play-off between Tom Watson and Stewart Cink at Turnberry only by bogeying the final hole.
“I’ve been knocking on the door a few times and it’s not happened.
“Winning on the European Tour is not easy. Now there’s an enormous weight off my shoulders and I feel I can go on and win more.”
“You don’t get many chances in a play-off, so I knew that was my chance - and I took it.”
Although he had won the Thailand Open in August last year, this was on an entirely different level with two of the world’s top five - Justin Rose and Louis Oosthuizen - and a host of Ryder Cup stars and major winners in the field.
“I probably went to sleep about midnight and woke up probably three, four, five, six (times). I knew I was having a lot of support from all of the text messages - a couple of them woke me up at one o’clock in the morning!” he said.
He and Garcia move on to Dubai for the last leg of the Tour’s three-week Desert Swing. Lee Westwood opens his year there.
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