Dylan Frittelli will make his WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play debut this week in the city he calls home at Austin Country Club.
The South African was born in Johannesburg but attended the University of Texas, sinking the winning putt for the Longhorns in the 2012 NCAA Men’s Golf Championships, and still lives in Austin.
Fellow University of Texas alumnus Jordan Spieth also secured a point in the final for the victorious 2012 team, and the duo played a practice round together on Monday.
It is all a far cry from last year’s event when Frittelli was watching as a spectator, 133rd in the Official World Golf Ranking and still searching for a first European Tour win.
Victory at the Lyoness Open powered by ORGANIC+ later that summer broke his duck and a second win at the AfrAsia Bank Mauritius Open means he tees it up in the Texas state capital ranked at 45th, comfortably inside the top 64 that qualify for the season’s second World Golf Championships event.
‘I said I’ll be here next year, I’ll be playing in this tournament,’ he told the press of his 2017 visit. ‘It was a goal I set myself. I kept on telling people and self-affirming. The more I told myself, the more I started to believe it.
‘I knew I had some opportunities starting that European Tour season last year, I’d be playing in bigger tournaments and the World Rankings go up. So that was basically the marker for me.
‘I knew what my standard was and I won a couple of times last year on the European Tour. If I did that, I’d be well inside the top 50.’
That justified level of confidence may exist now but Frittelli admits he has not always felt so good about his game.
He finished outside the top 100 on the Challenge Tour in 2014 and 2015 before graduating with an eighth-placed finish the following season and it took a lot of soul-searching – and hard work – to get him where he is today.
‘I had a bit of a downturn 2015, 2016 and I had to dig deep and figure things out,’ he said. ‘Outside the top 500 in the World Rankings, didn’t have a European Tour card.
‘I put a bunch of work in with my coach Chuck Cook and my mental coach Jay Branden in San Diego, and basically a year and a half of really solid, hard, diligent work has paid off in 2017. Now heading into 2018, it’s really looking rosy.
‘I’m happy to play anybody. Knowing the golf course, being familiar with everything and, again, being in good shape, I can take down anybody. Dustin’s No 1 in the world and I’m 50th in the world, I’m not worried.’
While confident in his ability on the big stage, Frittelli admits he would rather not face Spieth, although he would like it if, one day, the three-time Major winner was referred to as his teammate and not the other way round.
‘I walked on the first tee and I guess he followed me from the driving range,’ he said. ‘I had a nice group for nine holes, kept it nice, loose and lighthearted.
‘All the way around, I’m Jordan Spieth’s teammate. That’s the big flier on the PGA Tour and European Tour. Hoping to change that, maybe one day he’ll be co-teammate or something to that effect.’
Credit: European Tour
