Lascuña eyes to end string of frustrations with match play win

Antonio Lascuña —CONTRIBUTED PHOTO

Denied in the last three stroke play legs, Antonio Lascuña will be eyeing to end a string of close shaves starting Tuesday when the Philippine Golf Tour (PGT) holds its first match play event at tree-lined Villamor in Pasay City.

“It will be very different. And that bad this is you play not to be cut everyday,” Lascuña told the Inquirer in Filipino during practice at Manila Southwoods. “Unlike in stroke play, there’s the halfway cut and if you advance [to the weekend] close enough to the leaders, you have a chance.

“Next week, you play to save your tournament everyday, basically,” he added. “And it will be against a different player every time.”

Seeded second behind Dutchman Guide Van Der Valk, Lascuña looms as a solid favorite to go deep with the military-operated layout requiring precision on all holes while not playing as long as the other courses the tour plays.

Only the top 32 players in the ICTSI-sponsored men’s tour will be at Villamor, with the top 16 from the Ladies PGT taking part and the winners to take home P280,000 while having the honor of being the first match play champions.

Lascuña ended the season with three straight runner-up finishes, one of them at Riviera’s Langer course where he blew a two-stroke lead going to the final hole to lose to Juvic Pagunsan in a playoff.

“That was the most frustrating [of the second place finishes],” he said. “But that’s golf. You have to accept it and learn from it.”

Jesse Balasabas, who nipped Van der Valk in a playoff to nail a career breakthrough when Villamor last hosted a PGT event in the Philippine Masters in 2018, will be the 17th seed.

Miguel Tabuena, Pagunsan and Angelo Que are likely to skip the event due to their commitments abroad. INQ