Gaganjeet Bhullar among top 20 in Morocco golf tournament

Local lad Karandeep Kochhar had a roller-coaster ride, while it was a tale of contrasting nines for Gaganjeet Bhullar, who produced a 3-under 70 in the opening round of the $2 million International Series Morocco presented by Visit Morocco. After looking set for a low number with four birdies in five holes in the latter half of the front nine for a 4-under 32, he gave away three bogeys on the back nine for a 38.

Kochhar bogeyed his first three holes before finding his first par. Then he had a superb run of four birdies in four holes and parred the ninth to be 1-under at the turn. On the back nine, he bogeyed the 10th and birdied the 17th to stay at 1-under for the day.

Meanwhile, the four-time AM Green IGPL winner, Bhullar, who is also the most successful Indian player in Asian Tour history with 11 wins, is now tied-18th. He is the best among the 10 Indians playing this week at the par-73 Red Course of Royal Golf Dar es Salam in Rabat.

Bhullar now trails the Thai star Pavit Tangkamolprasert, the runner-up at the International Series Japan earlier this year, who shot 8-under 65. Pavit was two ahead of Travis Smyth (67), who was the winner in Japan. Smyth was tied for second position alongside Korean Younghan Song, who was bogey-free in his 67.

While Bhullar was tied-18th, the next best Indians were Kochhar, Shaurya Bhattacharya, SSP Chawrasia and Ajeetesh Sandhu, all of whom shot 1-under 72 each to be tied-40. Anirban Lahiri, the only Indian on the LIV League, carded even par 73 and was tied-60.

Rashid Khan (75) was tied-108, Shubham Jaglan (76) was tied-123rd, Aryan Roopa Anand (80) was tied-152nd and Udayan Mane (83) tied-155th, and all will need very low second rounds to have a chance to stay on for the weekend.

Bhullar, whose last Asian Tour win came in the second half of 2023 in Indonesia has played only three world ranking events with T26th in Singapore as his best. He was tied-27th at the AM Green IGPL Bharath Classic last week in Morocco, but at the Mazagan Beach Golf Resort.