Leaney Completes Maiden European Tour Victory Australian Stephen Leaney gained an emphatic maiden European Tour victory when he cruised to an eight shot triumph in the Moroccan Open at Golf Royal D’Agadir. The 29-year-old from Busselton, Western Australia, began the final round in splendid sunshine with a four shot lead ahead of England’s Mark Davis and Sweden’s Mathias Grönberg and Robert Karlsson with Germany’s Thomas Gögele and Sweden’s Karlsson a further two strokes adrift.
Then Leaney powered seven ahead with nine to play, stretched his lead on the inward half to ten at one stage before completing a 67 to win the £58,330 first prize with a 17-under-par total of 271. Karlsson took second place with a 71 for 279 - three ahead of Grönberg (74).
Leaney used a £40 putter he purchased in Caberra just before departing from Australia on a 36-hour journey to arrive in Morocco on Tuesday which, coincidentally, was his 29th birthday. He earned his European Tour card with six top-ten finishes in 1997, including finishing runner-up twice, and back in Australia he eventually took 12th place in the Order of Merit after three top-ten finishes.
A plus-four handicapper when he turned professional in 1992, Leaney was the only player in the field to complete all four rounds under 70 on the superb links course. “That’s as well as I’ve played tee to green for four rounds,” he said. “I did have a very good week when I won the Western Australian Open last year, but I don’t think my putter has worked as well for all four days since.”
Leaney’s eight shot win was the biggest winning margin on the European Tour in 13 months, and at one time he appeared prised to beat the 11 shot winning record set by Vijay Singh in the German Open in 1992. He lost that record by taking six at the long 15th, which was only his fourth bogey of the week, but by then was assured of victory. He had parred the first two holes, against Karlsson and Grönberg dropping one and two shots respectively, and with three birdies in a row from the third with putts of eight, 20 and 25 feet moved clear of his rivals
