Now Tommy Fleetwood can’t stop winning. This time he did so in India to make his son’s dream come true

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[Photo: Jason Butler]

Tommy Fleetwood had only recently broken through for a long-awaited maiden PGA Tour win at the season-ending Tour Championship when his son, Frankie, set him a new challenge.

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“We were at home last week and we were driving the buggy, playing golf together, and he just said randomly, ‘Do you know what you’ve never done? You’ve never won a tournament and I’ve been able to run on to the 18th green,’” Fleetwood said after winning the DP World India Championship on Sunday. “I was like, I’m writing that down.”

No need.

The only scribbling required for Fleetwood at the quirky Delhi Golf Club was a scorecard featuring eight birdies and a lone bogey for a final-round 65. At 22-under-par, Fleetwood earned a come-from-behind, two-shot victory over 54-hole leader Keita Nakajima (69), his final group playing partner who was relegated to second at 20-under. Fleetwood’s Ryder Cup-winning European teammate, Shane Lowry, was tied for third at 18-under alongside Alex Fitzpatrick and Thriston Lawrence. A chip-in eagle at No.18 helped Viktor Hovland into a tie for sixth alongside Jayden Schaper and Joost Luiten.

With Nakajima, Lowry, New Zealand’s Daniel Hillier and Hovland each making a run, Fleetwood broke away in stunning fashion courtesy of a five-hole stretch around the turn.

He drained a birdie from 16 feet at the par-3 seventh, before rifling a 260-metre approach to 21 feet at the par-5 eighth for a two-putt birdie. At the par-4 ninth, Fleetwood stiffed a 181m approach to eight feet and made another birdie, before bagging a fourth consecutive at the 10th when he poured in a 13-foot putt to join a share of the lead.

To sustain his momentum, the Southport lad negotiated a tricky seven-foot par putt at the 11th. From there, two emphatic birdies—a 12-footer after a greenside bunker shot at the par-5 14th and a long-range putt at the par-3 17th—sealed Fleetwood’s eighth career DP World Tour victory.

“I putted amazing today. I really, really did,” the 34-year-old said. “I played amazing, and down the stretch I holed some great putts, like mid-range putts. I felt like after gaining some momentum, just that [par] on 11, I hit a couple of poor iron shots there on 11 and 12, but that [par] putt was big. I managed to keep it going through the back nine.”

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Throughout the week, a curious subplot at the India Championship was the golf course. The Lodhi course at Delhi Golf Club measured just 6,320m and was among the shortest on the DP World Tour’s schedule. Its narrow fairways, many doglegs and thick Bermuda rough were all bordered by dense forests, prompting 58 golfers from the 138-player field (42 percent) to leave their drivers out of the bag this week.

Among those driver-less tour pros was the tournament’s headline act, Rory McIlroy, one of the greatest drivers of the ball on tour since Greg Norman and David Love III. McIlroy took one practice round in India to note that “the next time I hit my driver will be in Abu Dhabi” referring to the DP World Tour finals. He tied for 26th at 11-under.

While at first the layout seemed perplexing, Delhi GC’s charm was that course strategy was the No.1 storyline and fans likely wouldn’t remember the last time they saw tour pros hit that many long and mid-irons. “I’d rather leave myself two or three clubs back and hit a 7-iron into a par-4 instead of hitting a wedge,” McIlroy, the first reigning Masters champion to bring the green jacket to India, noted earlier in the week.

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Fittingly, Fleetwood hammered a 3-wood off the tee at the par-5 18th and another shot with the club from the fairway to just short of the green to allow himself a stroll to certain victory.

No player at Delhi GC had a sense of urgency like Fleetwood. India was his second DP World Tour start since the Ryder Cup, where he was Europe’s leading points scorer after going 4-1-0 at Bethpage. Yet for all his PGA Tour and Ryder Cup success in 2025, Fleetwood was at risk of missing out on the top 70 on the Race to Dubai rankings who advance to the DP World Tour playoffs next month. Not anymore.

“Yeah, lovely,” Fleetwood said when asked how it feels to be a DP World Tour winner again. “Since Ryder Cup, [I’ve] have had a few questions about [the fact I] hadn’t [yet] made it to the final two events of the year. I feel like for all the good that’s happened this year, a couple of things have disappointed me, that my DP World Tour year has. Another win feels great.”

Indeed, it would. But no greater than winning in front of his son Frankie for the first time.

“It’s just one of those little things it means a lot to me,” Fleetwood said. “That’s what I wanted to do all day.”