Chinese golfer Haotong Li delivered one of the most stunning meltdowns Augusta National has ever witnessed on the final day of the Masters.
The world No 84 headed into the final round at Augusta at seven-under within five shots of overnight leaders Rory McIlroy and Cameron Young. He even teed it up alongside Scottie Scheffler in the final flourish to a fairytale Masters week.
Li admitted earlier in the week that he played through Friday’s round battling illness after spending the entirety of the night prior ‘living in the toilet.’ At the 13th on Sunday, it was his narrow green jacket hopes that went down the toilet.
His approach shot into the raised green at the par-five appeared to be heading for the treacherous Rae’s Creek winding in front of the raised green. However, in one of the most unfortunate bounces, the ball pinged off the front bank and sailed into the luscious greenery to the side of the green.
It was an almost identical blunder to the one he made at the same location just a day prior when he sent his ball into the narrow strip of water. However, this time he couldn’t pull off a miraculous recovery.
After failing to hack his ball out of the bushes, he took a drop, finally finding the back fringe.
Chinese golfer Haotong Li delivered one of the most stunning Masters meltdowns
Li unbelievably putted his ball into Rae’s Creek from the back of the green at 13
Then, the most inexplicable moment arrived. In unbelievable scenes, the frazzled Li putted his ball off the green. His effort raced down the slope, rolling past a stunned Scheffler and his caddie Ted Scott, who had already been nearing the pin, and plopped right off the front bank and into Rae’s Creek.
By the time the ball finally disappeared inside the cup, Li had carded a quintuple bogey 10. The incomprehensible error dashed any hopes Li had of launching a last gasp charge to hunt down McIlroy and co. at the top of the leaderboard.
He had already suffered a card-wrecker on the previous hole. He triple bogeyed the notorious par-three Golden Bell to drop from seven-over to four-over.
He managed to scramble back a shot with a birdie at 14 but by then, it was too late. The damage was done.
