Kiwi Ryan Fox will enter the European Tour championship trailling world No.1 Rory McIlroy, after falling short of victory at the penultimate event of the season's schedule at Sun City.
After leading through the opening day of the Nedbank Golf Challenge, Fox, 35, slipped down the leaderboard through the middle two rounds, but stormed back into contention on the final day, finishing one stroke behind Englishman Tommy Fleetwood.
Victory would have propelled the second-ranked Kiwi past McIlory to the top of the tour standings, before this week's finale at Dubai.
Fox carded a four-under-par 68, including three consecutive birdies on the seventh, eighth and nine holes, to pocket 650,874 euros (NZ$1.1m) prizemoney, but bogeyed the final hole to blow the chance of a playoff against Fleetwood for the win.
"I played great and didn't miss a shot until the 18th," he said. "I certainly would've like to have played the 18th a little bit better and made Tommy work a little bit harder, but it's an incredibly tough golf course to play down the stretch.
"All of us were there or thereabouts with three holes to play, but Tommy was the one who held it together. Fair play to him.
"If you had given me second at the start of the week, I definitely would've taken it."
Fleetwood won for the first time in three years, since he took out this same event in 2019, but had to battle illness to complete the tournament.
"It was touch and go on Thursday morning," Fleetwood said. "Then Saturday, when we were up early and I felt like I had nothing in me, I was really poorly again.
"The doctor here has been amazing - I just gave his little son the winning golf ball. Without him, there was not a chance on Thursday I'd have played."
The tournament's second round was suspended by lightning and torrential rain, with play completed before the third round on Saturday.
"We didn't know what was happening, whether it would be three rounds, so I just thought if I could keep moving, keep playing... and I was playing well," said Fleetwood.
"It wasn't overly stressful for me and I just had in my mind to keep going and you never know what happens."
Newshub/Reuters
