‘Not Dead’: Despite Finally Finding Form, a Dejected Lydia Ko Expresses Disappointment on Her Comeback

The former world number one Lydia Ko, has had an underwhelming 2023 season. The Kiwi golfer started strong by winning the Saudi Ladies International in February, but since then there has been no win to speak of.

Ko entered the BMW Ladies Championship on sponsor exemption as the defending champion. This was a massive chance to prove herself and move forward in the LPGA race and she missed it just by 2 strokes. 

Lydia Ko’s career is slowly getting out of the slump

Lydia Ko has 19 LPGA Tour victories and has won two majors. In 2022, Ko was ranked as the world’s best LPGA golfer. And when she won the Saudi Ladies International, she was on the right track. However, after finishing T6 at Honda LPGA Thailand, she missed the top 10 spots consistently throughout the 2023 season.

There it was… Ko was suffering from a career slump. Her last performance at the Buick LPGA Shanghai was unsatisfactory as she stood at T50. Coming into the Seowon Hills event on sponsor exemption, the Kiwi was under pressure to do well — to all intents and purposes.

She entered the final round with scores 67-69-69, one short of the lead. On the final day, she made a bogey at hole 15 but recovered and finished with 2 birdies at 17th and 18th and a total of 14 under 274. She finished third, two shots short of a play-off participation.

In the post-match press conference, Ko looked a little disappointed and said, “I feel like I’ve been moving in the right direction and felt like I was moving in the right direction, but the results weren’t really a good reflection of that. So at least this week is a confirmation to say, hey, it’s not dead yet.”

Furthermore, she said that her first round had some of her ‘best putting’ and “That kind of set up the momentum for the rest of that week.” Despite failing to defend her title, the solo 3rd finish is much better than her recent past appearances. 

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What’s more from Lydia Ko?

In her own words, Ko played “solid” and “some of the best golf” this week. Now, she will travel to play in Malaysia at the LPGA Maybank Championship from October 26th to 29th. Despite not winning the South Korea event, the momentum is likely to pull her out of the slump.

There remain only three events until the LPGA reaches the final CME Group Tour Championship. Ko stands at 101st in the Race to CME Globe and is far away from glory. What do you think? Will she recover from her slump soon in the real sense? Tell us in the comments! 

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