Stanger - Adilson Da Silva of Brazil won his first Sunshine Tour event in two years when he took the SAA Pro-Am Invitational at the Prince’s Grant Golf Estate in Stanger, KwaZulu-Natal, on Saturday.

He birdied four of the last nine holes to pull one shot clear of his pursuers, his final round four-under 68 giving him 13-under 203 for the tournament and his first victory since the Vodacom Origins of Golf event at Fancourt in 2007.

He beat Anton Haig and Darren Fichardt into second, while Jbe’ Kruger and Keith Horne shared fourth, one stroke further back on 205.

First-round leader Darryn Lloyd saw his position on the leaderboard slip with a double-bogey seven on the 18th, and he ended up sharing sixth with Desvonde Botes and Andre Cruse on nine-under 207.

But once he got things rolling, there was no catching stopping Da Silva, a former resident of Prince’s Grant and a player very familiar with all the course’s twists and turns: “After nine holes, I was very disappointed, especially with a bogey on the 1st,” he said.

“And when I got to the back nine, I was really down on myself. But somehow, I got myself together again. I know the course, and I know I can go low on it.

“When I holed a birdie putt on the 10th, it gave me a bit of confidence,” he added.

He birdied 11 and 15 too, and when he got another on the 16th, he hit the front. “I did look at the scoreboard,” he confessed, “because Keith Horne was also 12 under, and I wanted to see what he would finish on.”

He needed to know, because the par-five 18th is a birdie chance, but by no means a pushover hole.

“Although it’s two years since I’ve won anything, I’ve been working pretty hard now, and with the support of my coaching team, my sponsors, and my wife, it’s paying off,” he said.

Kruger scorched home on the back nine in 31 to break the two-day-old course record set by Lloyd in the first round.

He went out on 33, which included a bogey five on the 367-metre 5th, and a par five on the 423-metre 6th, which played easiest on the course all weekend. “I hit my 121-metre approach a bit fat on the 5th,” said Kruger, “and couldn’t get it up and down out of the bunker.”

But it all went his way with five birdies on the homeward nine: “The putts started rolling in, for a change,” he said. “I also shot a 31 on that nine yesterday, without putting well, believe it or not.”

Final scores:

203 - Adilson da Silva (BRA) 68 67 68
204 - Anton Haig 70 67 67, Darren Fichardt 68 66 70
205 - Jbe' Kruger 73 68 64, Keith Horne 70 68 67
207 - Desvonde Botes 66 70 71, Andre Cruse 70 66 71, Darryn Lloyd 65 70 72
208 - Shaun Norris 70 69 69
209 - Neil Cheetham (ENG) 70 69 70, Willie van der Merwe 70 69 70
210 - Cameron Johnston 71 73 66, Keenan Davidse 75 68 67, Albert Pistorius 70 69 71, Divan van den Heever 68 70 72
211 - Charl Coetzee 72 72 67, Trevor Fisher Jnr 74 70 67, Jake Roos 72 71 68, Warren Abery 71 72 68, Tyrone van Aswegen 73 70 68, Johan du Buisson 72 69 70, Christiaan Basson 69 71 71
212 - Oliver Bekker 73 69 70, Ryan Thompson 70 70 72, Brett Liddle 67 73 72
213 - Rossouw Loubser 72 72 69, Vaughn Groenewald 74 70 69, Bradford Vaughan 73 70 70, Merrick Bremner 72 71 70, Mark Murless 71 69 73
214 - Jean Hugo 70 70 74, Jacques Blaauw 70 67 77
215 - Gerhard Trytsman 69 75 71, Doug McGuigan 75 69 71
216 - Omar Sandys 70 74 72, Prinavin Nelson 70 71 75, Michiel Bothma 68 72 76
218 - Alain Norris 72 71 75
219 - Hendrik Buhrmann 69 74 76, Attie Schwartzel 71 72 76
227 - Toto Thimba (Jnr) 73 71 83
DQ - Mohamed Tayob 73 69