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Sergio Garcia Wins LIV Golf Playoff After Anirban Lahiri Misses 2-Foot Putt for Title

The India native was set up for his first LIV Golf title until a ghastly miss on the 54th hole.

John Schwarb

Anirban Lahiri missed a putt from close range that would have given him his first LIV Golf title
Anirban Lahiri missed a putt from close range that would have given him his first LIV Golf title / LIV Golf broadcast

Add Anirban Lahiri to the unfortunate list of pros to miss very short putts to cost them victories.

The Indian was set up for his first victory in LIV Golf on Sunday at Valderrama in Spain, needing just a par at the 18th hole after Sergio Garcia bogeyed his final hole in the 54-hole tournament.

Lahiri reached the green of the par-4 in two and hit his first putt to what appeared to be tap-in range. But then this happened:

LIV Golf's broadcasters called it an 18-inch putt; it certainly wasn’t longer than 2 feet. And just like that, Lahiri was left in shock and Garcia was now back in the hunt for his first LIV Golf win.

The two went to a sudden-death playoff and, to Lahiri’s credit, he made a gutsy up-and-down with a 6-foot par putt on that same 18th hole to match a par from Garcia and go to a second playoff hole. But the native of Pune, India, made a messy double bogey on his third trip through the 18th hole and Garcia won with a par and collected the $4 million first prize.

MORE: Final payouts from LIV Golf Andalucia

For Garcia, it was his first LIV Golf title and a popular one in front of home fans in Andalucia, Spain. The 44-year-old had lost three times previously in LIV playoffs including two this year; he lost to Joaquin Niemann on the fourth playoff hole in the season opener at Mayakoba and to Dean Burmester on the second extra hole in April in Miami.

LIV Golf had its first double playoff Sunday as the team championship also went to a playoff. The same two teams represented in the individual playoff were in the team playoff—Sergio Garcia’s Fireballs and Lahiri’s Crushers—with Abraham Ancer and David Puig of the Fireballs defeating Bryson DeChambeau and Paul Casey of the Crushers. 

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John Schwarb

JOHN SCHWARB

John Schwarb is a senior editor for Sports Illustrated covering golf. Prior to joining SI in March 2022, he worked for ESPN.com, PGATour.com, Tampa Bay Times and Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He is the author of The Little 500: The Story of the World's Greatest College Weekend. A member of the Golf Writers Association of America, Schwarb has a bachelor's in journalism from Indiana University.

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