Anirban Lahiri narrowly misses maiden PGA Tour title, finishes second at The Players Championship

Indian golfer Anirban Lahiri finished his Players Championship campaign just one step back to create a history.

Lahiri, who started the final day with one stroke advantage, carded a decent 3-under 69 to end as runner-up at the prestigious Players Championship.

Cameron Smith had a superb final round, in which he shot 6-under 66 to claim a one-stroke victory over Anirban Lahiri on a Monday resulted event.

Despite some errors on the front-nine, Lahiri was still in the race to clinch his maiden title as after the 63-hole game, both Lahiri and Smith were at matching 9-under 243.

The real nail-biting game started when Smith shot four consecutive birdies from 10th to 14th while Lahiri in those four holes only managed to hit one birdie and three pars that left him two shots behind Smith after 13 holes.

Both then had three consecutive pars.

Smith then smashed a birdie on the 17th, and Anirban also shot a birdie.The 28-year-old Australian who after 17th was looking like a clear winner had a bogey on the final hole that gave Anirban hopes to force a playoff if he shot a birdie.

Anirban started his final hole journey with a brilliant 281 yards shot to fairway, he covered another 157 yards in the second shot, but the hole was still 41 feet and 4 inches far to force a playoff.

After taking his time, Lahiri covered 40 ft. 5 inches in his third shot instead of 41 ft. 4 inches to the green, handing Smith a one-shot victory.

Arjun Atwal, the first and only Indian to win a PGA Tour championship, did so in 2010. No Indian has won a PGA Tour event since then.

Paul Casey finished a further shot back at third position with a tournament total of 11-under 277.

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