Southport’s Tommy Fleetwood leads an impressive European showing in Mexico

Southport’s Tommy Fleetwood leads an impressive European showing in Mexico

The Ryder Cup may be more than 18 months away, but Thomas Bjorn would surely have been delighted with a superb European challenge at the WGC-Mexico Championship.

World No 1 Dustin Johnson held his nerve down the stretch to clinch a one-shot victory, but the next four places on the leaderboard were occupied by prospective members of Bjorn’s European team for next September’s contest in Paris.

Tommy Fleetwood piled the pressure on Johnson when he set the clubhouse target at 13 under, although the Abu Dhabi champion had to settle for outright second in only his sixth appearance in a World Golf Championship event.

The talented English man that started out at on Southport Municipal looked to be out of the running when he bogeyed the eighth following earlier birdies at the first and sixth, but he suddenly revived his challenge after the turn.

Fleetwood appeared to have sunk an eagle putt from 10 feet at the 11th only to look on in astonishment as his ball performed a 360-degree lip-out, but he tapped in for birdie and claimed further shots at 12 and 15 before nailing a monster 40-foot putt for another gain at the last to card an excellent 66.

Johnson’s march to the title hit the buffers when he made back-to-back bogeys at 12 and 13, and charismatic Spaniard Jon Rahm suddenly found himself in a tie for the lead with the American when he eagled the 11th and holed from 35 feet for birdie at 14.

Rahm, who announced last week that he would be taking up European Tour membership in a bid to make his Ryder Cup debut next year, moved to 14 under with another birdie at the 15th, but poor approaches to each of the next two greens were to prove costly.