England’s Charley Hull relishes nothing more than a big challenge and a scintillating opportunity has presented itself this week.
The two-time Solheim Cup player won the CME Group Tour Championship three weeks ago – which was the LPGA’s season-ending tournament – and now she has her eyes on the Omega Dubai Ladies Masters trophy, which is the Ladies European Tour’s spectacular end-of-year prize.
“It would be pretty cool if I could finish with a win on the LET,” said the 20-year-old from Kettering, who finished fifth in the event in 2014 and eighth in 2013, the year she secured the LET’s Rookie of the Year Award at Emirates Golf Club.
“I do have great memories of this event. It’s fun; I like it, especially winning Rookie of the Year, because I remember it being quite close between me and Holly (Clyburn) and I kind of felt the pressure, but played well for it, and the year after, when there was a bit of a battle between me and Gwladys (Nocera).”
In 2014, Hull crowned her season as the youngest ever winner of the LET’s Order of Merit, having recorded nine top 10 finishes including her first win at the Lalla Meryem Cup in Morocco.
She continued: “I feel pretty good with my golf game at the moment. So I will hopefully try to look for a win here because I’ve never actually won the tournament. It would be pretty cool to finish the season on a high.”
Hull’s greatest challengers will include the defending champion Shanshan Feng, who has won the tournament three times in the last four years and Hull described how she recently picked up some hints from the Chinese bronze medallist.
“When she won, I think it was in Japan, she said that she doesn’t look at scoreboards on the way around, so I didn’t look at the score boards when I won in America at the CME event and I won, so hopefully I can do it again this week.”
The world number 18, who finished seventh at the Rio Olympic Games, still has many goals ahead.
“There’s majors and I want to win more tournaments and become world number one and there’s the Olympics, so you’ve got loads of things,” she said.
Her chase for a third win since turning professional begins at 7.45am in Dubai on Wednesday, when she will tee up alongside Gwladys Nocera and Suzann Pettersen from the 10th.
