'Thompson justifiably angry at low-key finish'

Lexi Thompson has spent 14 years as a professional golfer after turning pro at the age of 15

Even when there is a record $4m first prize, women’s golf seems to get short changed.

The LPGA season came to a thrilling climax in the United States with the CME Group Tour Championship, sensationally won by Thailand’s Jeeno Thitikul.

But the action was shoe-horned into an early television window that required a depressing revamping of its format.

While the initial rounds were played at a refreshing two-ball pace, the last lap was conducted in stodgy threesomes with half the field playing the back nine first.

For Lexi Thompson, this resulted in an inappropriately low-key finish to her full-time career at the age of 29.

The 11-times LPGA tour winner, who remains one of the game’s most popular players, was left to complete her final round among the anonymous surrounds of the ninth green.

These things can happen when outside influences dictate a two-tee start. Thompson had not performed well enough to be among the leaders who began their rounds on the first tee.

But this was still a snub - for Thompson in particular and the women’s game at large.

The altered format, showing the climax of the season in a less enticing light, was simply down to the need for an early finish. Why? To allow the American networks to then switch attention to the men’s action on the PGA Tour.

“Bummed I won’t be able to embrace all the incredible fans on 18 as I finish, hopefully some will be out there on 9,” Thompson told her legion of social media followers when she lay 30th after the third round at Tiburon Golf Club in Florida.

“Pretty sad when you’re at –4 in the season-ending event, which could easily be the last CME of your career, and you won’t even finish on 18 because they decide to double tee on the final day due to TV coverage window.”

This should have been a moment to celebrate one of the more significant careers in LPGA history. Thompson’s farewell deserved the widest possible coverage.

She celebrated only one major win, at the event now known as the Chevron Championship, a decade ago. But she has been a fixture on the biggest leaderboards; four times she was runner-up among 13 top-5 major finishes.

And Thompson had etched her name into golfing history long before that lone triumph at Mission Hills in 2014.

As a 12-year-old in 2007, she became the youngest player to qualify for the US Open. She made it to the grandest of the female slams again in each of the next two years and aged 14 played all four rounds to finish in a share of 34th place.

Thompson was just a year older when she turned professional and was runner-up at the Evian Championship in her inaugural summer among the paid ranks.

She seemed endlessly and globally newsworthy. Two months shy of her 17th birthday, Thompson posted her first win in Dubai to become the youngest professional winner on the Ladies European Tour.

It is fair to say that at every stage of her career she has been a superstar attraction. Posters to flog tournament tickets would invariably display her image. She is one of the few female players to regularly appear on the front cover of golf magazines.

Yes, there have been significantly more successful careers, but Thompson was always box office.

When at her very best, there were very few who could live with her as a golfer. But there were also frailties. Majors slipped from her grasp due to short game woes; her vulnerabilities making her all the more interesting.

Infamously, in 2017 a television viewer spotted her incorrectly replacing her ball on the green towards the end of her third round at the ANA Inspiration. But the offence only came to light on the final day.

It was worth a two-shot penalty, doubled because she had obliviously signed for the wrong score in the third round. It was so very Lexi. Her commanding position in that major was wiped away. Ultimately she lost a play-off to Ryu So-yeun.

Thompson was a mainstay of seven Solheim Cups, appearing on the winning side three times including this year in Virginia. Her overall record of 10 wins and 10 losses from her 27 matches reflects the enigmatic character of her career.

She could often be tetchy and guarded with the media but never with galleries. She connected with her followers - on course and online.

“I just love watching her. She’s so much more than just a great golfer,” I heard an AIG Women’s Open fan say while Thompson commanded the most sizeable first-round galleries at a windswept St Andrews last summer.

She will play more tournaments, but last weekend was the end of Thompson’s full-time career and she deserved a more rousing send off.

Indeed the lucrative $11m season-ending tournament, which also marked the end of the careers of US Solheim players Ally Ewing and Marina Alex, warranted better treatment from the networks.

The man putting his hand in his pocket to record effect, the title sponsor’s boss, Terry Duffy, raged against the decision not to show the third round on live television.

“I think that’s inappropriate for a tournament of this magnitude to be on tape delay,” the CME Group chief executive told the Palm Beach Post.

“If you are going to continue to build women’s sports, you have to give them the same billing as men and stop the nonsense of saying we have to show the men’s tournament because they’re the men.”

Thompson spent her career proving the female side of the sport deserves a proper spotlight. As the man who is prepared to put millions upon millions into the women’s game attests, it clearly still fails to shine to maximum effect.