After a year-long battle in the Order of Merit, it has all come down to the final event of the 2025 Ladies European Tour (LET) season – the Andalucía Costa del Sol Open de España presented by Oysho.
Singapore’s Shannon Tan and England’s Mimi Rhodes go head-to-head in the season-ending tournament and will battle it out at Real Guadalhorce Club de Golf to earn the prestigious LET Order of Merit crown.
It’s been an excellent 2025 for the duo with plenty of silverware between the pair. Tan leads the Order of Merit by 219.26 points ahead of Rhodes heading into the final event in Malaga.
Even though one of them will be crowned the LET’s number one player at the end of the week, they’re sticking with the same processes during the tournament.
“My mindset is the same as I have coming into every other event, just stick to the fairways and greens and boring golf. It will be the same mindset, nothing different,” said Tan.
“Comparing this year to last year, I’ve been more consistent and that’s because of stuff that I’ve picked up and learned from last year. I didn’t play as many events back-to-back and that has contributed to my consistency this year.”
Rhodes explained: “Similarly to Shannon, I won’t be changing my mindset. I’ve got a lot out of this year that I’m proud of. We’ll see how it goes but either way I’m really happy with how the year has panned out.
“Shannon had a really good week in India, so she deserves to be leading right now. Hopefully, I will try and get the lead back. At the end of the day, it’s my first year out here. I’ve made really good friends with Shannon, so there’s no beef.”
The LET’s season finale featuring a field of 75 players takes place at Real Guadalhorce Club de Golf from 27-30 November.
It is a course the duo have knowledge on, Rhodes due to growing up not too far away from the venue and Tan finished in a share of 16th place at the 2024 edition.
“This course isn’t far from home, so I’ve competed here a lot,” said Rhodes. “I think it was the Under-14 Spanish Championship, and I played with Valentina Albertazzi and we won the U14s. It was playing a lot longer then because I’m hitting it further now, but I have good memories and it’s nice to be close to home.
Tan added: “I have been working on my wedge game for the past two weeks, I had a few wedge shots last year and that’s something I can really pick up in my game in general. I have still focused on my normal stuff of fairways and greens, but I’ve been working on wedges in addition to it.”
Rhodes started the season with a bang winning three times in the space of two months securing victories at the Ford Women’s NSW Open, Joburg Ladies Open and Dutch Ladies Open and leaping to the top of the season-long rankings.
Meanwhile Tan has had a more consistent season with her wins coming at the Amundi German Masters in June and Hero Women’s Indian Open in October to propel her to the top of the Order of Merit.
With everything to play for at the final event, if Tan can finish ahead or level with Rhodes then she will win the Order of Merit title, whereas Rhodes must beat Tan and finish in the top three to have a chance of winning.
On Thursday, the top two will battle it out together playing in the same group and it would have significance for both if they were to win the title.
“It would mean a lot to me to win,” said Tan. “Looking at the list of players who have won the Order of Merit, Georgia Hall is my idol, and she won it in 2017 and 2018. It would mean a lot.
“Me and Mimi have played together a couple of times together in tournaments and have played practice rounds together. We are friends off the course and get along. I enjoy playing with Mimi and I know it’ll be fun out there, that’s the most important thing. Gameplan-wise I will just keep it the same and take it one shot at a time.”
Rhodes added: “Of course, I want to win the Order of Merit. It’s been on my radar since I got those wins at the start of the year. It’s a nice event to play this week before Q-Series to keep the ball rolling. I’m not going to think too much about it. I’ve had a good year, but it would be nice to come out on top having been on top for most of the year.
“Subconsciously, it might be there when we play together because we’re both thinking about winning the Order of Merit, but once we get past the few holes we will get back to normal and focus on our own game and have fun out there. This course you can’t stress out about things other than the course, I’ll be focusing shot by shot and we can have some chats.”
Tan and Rhodes will tee it up in round one with defending champion Carlota Ciganda at 12.16 pm at Real Guadalhorce Club de Golf.
Follow all the action throughout on our socials – @LETgolf on Instagram, TikTok and X, and Ladies European Tour on YouTube and Facebook – #OpenDeEspaña.
