On a weekend in which England seemed destined to conquer the much-favoured French, we saw the England Ladies take to the football pitch in the UEFA Women's Championship to defeat French opposition for the first time in more than forty years. Meanwhile, England's Jordan Smith sealed his first-ever European Tour victory in a play-off win over Frenchman Alex Levy in the Porsche European Open at Hamburg's Green Eagle Golf Course. 

When Jordan Smith threw away a three-shot lead on the final day, it felt an all too familiar sight for English sports fans, and the outcome looked inevitable. Smith held a two-shot advantage heading into Sunday, with his -12 edging Levy's -10. The 24-year-old from Bath birdied his first hole to extend his lead to three strokes, before Levy restored the two-shot margin on the second with a birdie of his own after chipping in delicately from the bunker. Bogeys at the sixth and eighth offered Levy a golden opportunity, which he graciously took with a PAR and a birdie at the respective holes to turn a two-shot deficit into a one-shot advantage. However, his lead lasted but one hole before his bogey allowed Smith to level with PAR at the tenth and regain the lead with a birdie at eleven. Things were all square once more (thanks to Smith's bogey at the thirteenth) when the pair exchanged birdies at the fifteenth. It appeared that Levy had done enough to retain his title with a birdie at the following hole, but Smith's last-gasp birdie at the eighteenth set up a play-off. Suffice to say, there was a fair bit of finger-counting in the audience as people tried to keep up with the tit-for-tat exchanges at the summit of the leaderboard.

As the pair headed into the play-off, the crowd were, I can only assume, already looking at train times on their phones (not that you'd have trouble catching a train in a major German city). This was understandable as we were looking at a man with four European Tour victories, including two play-off successes from four attempts, against a man with no victories on the European Tour and no play-off experience. If that wasn't enough, Alex Levy's two play-off victories were in this year's Volvo China Open and in last year's edition of the Porsche European Open. The odds were stacked toweringly against the Englishman as he took on the defending champion. Unsurprisingly, Levy found himself with a short putt for victory on the first play-off hole. Just a few feet from the hole, Levy decided to give us a reminder of how fantastically unpredictable golf is. Alright, maybe he just fluffed his lines. Either way, the 26-year-old missed the birdie putt and had to settle for PAR and continue the battle. The second play-off hole saw Smith find himself in an eerily similar position to Levy at the previous, but the young Englishman held his cool to hole for birdie and victory. 

Jordan Smith - What's in the Bag

Driver: TaylorMade 2017 M1

Fairway Wood: TaylorMade 2017 M2 Tour

Utility: Titleist 718 T-MB

Irons: Mizuno MP-18

Wedges: Titleist Vokey SM6

Putter: TaylorMade Spider Tour Black 

Written by Joe Carabini

joe.carabini@foremostgolf.com