Hannah Green puts on star performance to clinch HSBC Women’s Championship

[SINGAPORE] The winning putt was a one-handed perfunctory tap-in.

Victory finally may have come by only one shot, but whichever way you look at it, it was clearly Hannah Green who deserved to win on Sunday (Mar 1), the final day of the US$3 million 2026 HSBC Women’s World Championship.

Green, 29, the 2024 winner of the event at Sentosa Golf Club’s renowned Tanjong course, was solely atop the leaderboard from the very first hole which she birdied.

And by the 15th par-three hole which she converted for a near-20-foot birdie from the fringe, the stamp of the victory – which gave her the winner’s cheque of US$450,000 – was convincingly hers with a three-shot advantage.

The chasers were Minjee Lee, and Americans Auston Kim and Angel Yin.

However, World No 20 Green saw off the opposition from the 72-woman field with a quality game of power an precision, buoyed by an eagle and four birdies in her 14-under total of 274 with a final-round 69.

Even after the two-shot swing which saw her lead cut to two after the 14th hole which Lee birdied and she bogeyed after her drive landed among the trees, Green managed to hold her nerves and respond with the next-hole birdie.

After the one-shot victory over Kim – greeted by loud cheers and being drenched with champagne on the 18th green by her fans – she hugged her husband and caddie Jarryd Felton, a professional golfer.

Felton, a former winner in New Zealand, was the first to acknowledge her calmness, any evident pressure being turned into an antidote to remain steady with his help.

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On nerves, Green said: “I was talking to my caddie husband, and saying... I don’t know why I am feeling this way. I haven’t really felt like that in a while, but I guess if it’s been that long (500 days since her last win), perhaps that’s why.

“I felt like I was hitting a lot of good shots. I just... had to stay patient. That’s... what I did. I told Jarryd a couple of times that I wasn’t feeling too comfortable, and he said just take a deep breath or just have something to eat or have a sip of water.”

Her bogey-bogey finish – the first on the par-three 17th because of a lipout – underlined that she had done enough to cruise to a triumphant finish.

Long-hitter Kim, playing two flights in front, at one stage looked set to provide some resistance when she cut the lead to two with some brilliant late play marked by three birdies, but an unfortunate bogey on the 15th put paid to that.

However, big-hitter Kim with the day’s longest drive of 312 yards, returned the round’s lowest score of 67, shared with Japanese Chisato Iwai. Kim finished two shots ahead of third-placed Frenchwoman Pauline Roussin-Bouchard (68), Yin (71) and Lee (72).

Singapore’s amateur Chen Xingtong bounced back after the third-round 79 with a 71 for tied-60th while her professional teammate Shannon Tan was 69th after a 75.

Defending champion Lydia Ko of New Zealand finished joint-27th after a 72 while pre-tournament favourite Atthaya “Jeeno” Thitikul of Thailand shot 73 for tied 31st.