Reports: Olesen accused of sexual assault on flight
Published 10:15 pm Thursday, August 1, 2019
GREENSBORO (AP) — Byeong Hun An and Sungjae Im each shot 8-under 62 on Thursday to share the lead after one round at the Wyndham Championship.
Mackenzie Hughes, Rory Sabbatini, Patrick Rodgers and Johnson Wagner were a stroke back behind the South Korean leaders in the final PGA Tour event before the FedEx Cup playoffs.
Former Wyndham winners Brandt Snedeker and Webb Simpson joined Jordan Spieth among the nine players at 64.
The co-leaders shot the best rounds of their PGA Tour careers. An, a 27-year-old South Korean seeking his first career victory on tour, closed with birdies on four of his final six holes and a sand save on the par-4 18th.
An had four birdies on the front nine at Sedgefield Country Club along with those four on the back nine during his bogey-free round. He hit 15 greens in regulation.
“I’ve got to do a couple more of these rounds,” An said. “One good round won’t do it, so I need to keep it up and make a lot of birdies.”
Im, one of nine players in the field with a chance at finishing in the top 10 on the points list and earning some bonus money as part of the new Wyndham Rewards Top 10 program, had three straight birdies on Nos. 14-16 and also was bogey-free. He started at No. 25 on the points list.
For a while, it looked as though Spieth would join them atop the leaderboard — teeing off on No. 18 one stroke behind the leaders, but he sent his drive out of bounds. After taking the penalty stroke, he placed his fourth stroke 21 feet from the flagstick and rolled in that putt for arguably the best bogey of the day.
“I got up there and had a putt at it, I was just trying to get the right speed,” Spieth said. “And 5 feet to go, it looked really good, just like they did all day.”
Spieth had just 23 putts during his round.
“You want putts for birdie. You want to be hitting greens in regulation,” Spieth said. “Really, two bad swings today kept it from being my lowest round on the PGA Tour. There’s a lot of good in that.”
At No. 67 on the points list, Spieth — the 2015 FedEx Cup champion — is in no danger of missing the postseason.
Others at Sedgefield aren’t so secure.
The top 125 qualify for The Northern Trust next week at Liberty National, and are assured of keeping their tour cards for next season, if they don’t already have them.
Garnett, who started at No. 121 on the points list, and Power, who is No. 144, are among those who are squarely on the playoff bubble.
“I know if it doesn’t go well where I’m going,” said Josh Teater, who is No. 165. “So I kind of made that up … in my mind a few weeks back that, hey, if I make all three cuts and finish 40th, it makes no difference, so let’s go try to play great and if we end up playing terrible, it doesn’t matter.”
The other main subplot at Sedgefield is the chase for the top 10 and the remaining $5.3 million in bonus money that is still up for grabs. The top three spots have been locked up.
Paul Casey, who at No. 8 on the points list is the highest-ranked player in the field. Eight other players, including Simpson, began the tournament with a shot at climbing into the top 10 and claiming some of that bonus cash.
LONDON (AP) — Police arrested Ryder Cup player Thorbjorn Olesen on suspicion of sexually assaulting a female passenger while she was asleep on a flight to London, intoxication and failing to comply with the orders from the airline crew, British newspapers reported Thursday.
The Sun and The Independent cited Metropolitan Police as saying a 29-year-old was arrested when the British Airways flight landed Monday at Heathrow.
Olesen played in the World Golf Championships event in Memphis, Tennessee, where he tied for 27th. The 29-year-old Dane has five European Tour victories and made his Ryder Cup debut last year by going 1-1, beating Jordan Spieth in singles as Europe won.
The PGA Tour said in a statement it was aware of the arrest, calling the allegations “deeply troubling.”
Olesen’s agent at Hambric Sports Group in Europe, Rory Flanagan, did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.
Olesen allegedly got into an argument with other passengers in first class. He also is alleged to have urinated in the aisle.
The Sun reported that Ian Poulter, who also played the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, was on the flight and tried to calm the situation.
Poulter’s agent, Paul Dunkley, told The Sun that Poulter helped calm a “slightly intoxicated” passenger and then went to sleep “and the first he knew of anything else was when the police were waiting at Heathrow.”
Police said he was taken into custody and released under investigation.
The European Tour does not have a tournament until the Czech Masters from Aug. 15-18. Olesen, who is No. 62 in the world, is not a PGA Tour member and ineligible for any tournaments during the final month of the U.S. season.
Olesen, who was a PGA Tour member in 2013-14, received a foreign exemption to the AT&T Byron Nelson this year. He qualified for two other regular PGA Tour events.
“These are very serious and deeply troubling allegations,” the tour said in a statement. “Even though he is not a member of the PGA Tour, a claim of this magnitude is something we take very seriously. We are in close contact with our counterparts at the European Tour.”
The PGA Tour said it would not comment further until it gets additional information.