Lee Westwood has 44 professional wins across 20 different countries in his storied career. Now at age 52, six years removed from his last victory and having just returned from a wrist injury, the Majesticks Golf Club co-captain is in position to finish off arguably his most impressive performance.
Westwood enters Sunday’s final round at Aramco LIV Golf Singapore as the co-leader at 10 under with Torque GC Captain Joaquin Niemann. The Englishman will play in the final group of the final round for the first time in his LIV Golf career and seeks to become the oldest player to win a league individual title.
“I’m 53 on the 24th of April, so at that stage, it would probably be the best win of my career,” Westwood said after making birdies on three of his final four holes to shoot a 3-under 68 in difficult conditions at Sentosa Golf Club.
“All of my wins have special memories. But to still be competitive at my age and up there and having chances to win tournaments like this is validation for driving myself on and doing all the hard work and practice that nobody sees and still being competitive and having a good enough game to compete against them.”
Westwood, however, isn’t the only player entering Sunday in the hunt with a chance to make history.
Niemann, who won five times last season but started slowly this season, made a charge up the leaderboard of his own, shooting a 5-under 66 that included seven birdies and two bogeys. With a win, Niemann would earn his eighth LIV Golf victory, which would be three more than any other player in league history.
“I hit the ball unbelievable today compared to the other days,” Niemann said. ”I was able to see the ball in the windows that I was seeing in my mind. Yeah, it was nice. I played pretty confident. I was able to attack a lot of pins.”
Niemann will enter the final round of a tournament with the lead or co-lead for the fifth time in his LIV Golf career. He went on to win in each of the four previous times (Mayakoba and Jeddah in 2024; Singapore and UK last season). A win would make him just the second player to successfully defend a LIV Golf title after Brooks Koepka in Jeddah (2022-23).
“It’s really nice to be in this situation right now,” Niemann said. “I feel like it’s been close – obviously not the best results overall in the first three events. … I feel like the game is trending in the right direction.”
Bryson DeChambeau, who entered the third round with a three-shot lead, struggled to a 1-over 72 but made the best of a tough day to keep himself in the tournament at just one shot back of the co-leaders. The Crushers GC captain made three birdies that were offset by four bogeys as he struggled with a cold putter throughout the round.
Despite losing the lead, DeChambeau is pleased with how he’s played.
“For some reason, there wasn’t as much wind around there and I guess the greens got slower in that area and I three-putted a few of them and that cost me some momentum,” he said. “Other than that, I played great golf. I almost played just as good as yesterday, just things didn’t line up.”
Richard T. Lee is tied for third with DeChambeau after shooting a 2-under 69 and, like Niemann and Westwood, has a chance to set league history. A win would make him the first LIV Golf Wild Card player to earn a tournament title, and he’s also on pace to eclipse the best-ever finish for a LIV Golf Wild Card player (T12).
“(A win) would change a lot in my life, with my family,” Lee said. “Yeah, just playing with these guys in this big league, I think it would be a great honor to win.”
After the top four, a bunched pack of players are well within reach of an individual victory. Jon Rahm, whose streak of 23 consecutive rounds under par ended with an even-par 71, is three shots back of the lead at 7 under.
The individual leaderboard should create a thriller on Sunday, but the team leaderboard is just as chaotic.
Hong Kong champions 4Aces GC surged to the top of the leaderboard after under-par rounds from three of their four players, giving them a score of 16 under for the week. Dustin Johnson (68), Anthony Kim (68) and Thomas Pieters (70) produced strong rounds for the resurgent squad while Thomas Detry (73) slipped down the leaderboard after two brilliant rounds of 68-67 to begin the week.
“Obviously we’re in a really good position,” Johnson, the 4Aces GC captain, said. “But it’s going to take all four of us playing well tomorrow. This golf course is hard, and if we all four play well, then we’ll probably have a really good chance to win.”
With a win on Sunday, the Aces would win in back-to-back starts for the first time since LIV Golf’s inaugural season in 2022.
Ripper GC, who won the first two tournaments this season, and defending Team Champions Legion XIII are just two shots back of the Aces. The Australian squad was led by Elvis Smylie, who shot a bogey-free 4-under 67 that included an eagle and two birdies, while Legion XIII was led by a 2-under 69 from Tyrrell Hatton.
Like their captain, Crushers GC entered the day with a three-shot lead. The team shot 9-over for the round with all four of their players shooting over par, dropping them all the way to sixth.
TOP OF THE LEADERBOARDS
Individual Top 10
T1 (-10) – Joaquin Niemann, Crushers (69-68-66); Lee Westwood, Majesticks GC (67-68-68)
T3 (-9) – Richard T. Lee, Wild Card (67-68-69); Bryson DeChambeau, Crushers GC (67-65-72)
5 (-7) – Jon Rahm, Legion XIII (67-68-71)
6 (-6) – Marc Leishman, Ripper GC (68-68-71)
T7 (-5) – Dustin Johnson, 4Aces GC (71-69-68), Tyrrell Hatton, Legion XIII (68-71,69); Talor Gooch, Smash GC (70-68-70); Josele Ballester, Fireballs GC (73-66-69); Brendan Steele, HyFlyers GC (70-71-67); Thomas Detry, 4Aces GC (71-69-68); Louis Oosthuizen, Southern Guards GC (68-67-73)
Team Top 3
1 (-16) – 4Aces GC (Johnson 68, Kim 68, Pieters 70, Detry 73; Rd. 3 score: -5)
T2 (-14) – Ripper CG (Smylie 67, Smith 69, Leishman 71, Herbert 71; Rd. 3 score: -6)
T2 (-14) – Legion XIII (Hatton 69, McKibbin 70, Rahm 71, Surratt 72; Rd. 3 score: -2)
ROUND 3 NOTES
CHASING SPEED: 54-hole co-leader Lee Westwood has found his form quickly despite missing the first two tournaments of the 2026 season after suffering a tendon injury in his left wrist. He returned last week at Hong Kong and finished tied for 18th. “I was in my simulator at home, and I forgot I was nearly 53, thinking I was 23, and tried to get up to 180 mile-an-hour ball speed and was off the floor hitting it, and just on my follow-through I felt something kind of click or pop,” Westwood explained.
On Sunday, he’ll play with two-time major winner Bryson DeChambeau and 7-time LIV Golf winner Joaquin Niemann. DeChambeau is 32 years old; Niemann is 27.
“I’ve always been fiercely competitive,” Westwood said. “I find a competition in anything I’m doing, and now I’m at an age where it’s about getting in there and showing the younger lads that I can still do it and shaking it up a bit. They could be under pressure a bit tomorrow with an old man like me staring them down, or they might just relax and play well. You never know.”
Niemann and Westwood will be in the same group for just the second time at a LIV Golf tournament. Their only previous group came in the final round in Andalucía in 2023.
“Obviously, he’s a lot older than me. He has a lot of experience,” Niemann said. “He’s an unbelievable golfer, has a great career, and he’s still a lot to impress everybody. I haven’t played much with him, so I’m looking forward to spending time with him tomorrow, playing a round of golf. It’s nice to see him perform. He kind of struggled a little bit last year. I feel like he was pretty close to relegation last year, and him being able to come back and work hard as he did, and for the age that he has, for how many years he’s been working hard and trying to figure it out –I really respect that and respect his game because of that. It’ll be good to play with him and learn from him as well tomorrow.”
Although Sunday will be the first time Westwood has been in the final group in the final round of a LIV Golf tournament, he has plenty of experience in final-round battles during a career in which he’s won in four different decades.
Asked what lessons he’s learned, Westwood replied: “Just that anything can happen. We don’t have much control over external things. I could play great tomorrow. I could play poorly. I could play great and not shoot a very good score. I could play poorly and shoot a great score. You don’t know what’s going to happen. Really just controlling the controllables and sticking to my process and what I’ve done over the first three days and not get carried away with the position I’m in or trying to do too much, especially around this golf course. I get the feeling if you try and do too much around this golf course and get too aggressive, it’ll bite you.”
THREE-PUTTS APLENTY: Saturday’s round averaged 1.82 putts when hitting the green in regulation. Excluding 2022’s partial season, it’s the seventh-highest putting average when hitting GIR in LIV Golf history. There were 44 three-putts Saturday, also the seventh most in a round in league history.
Jon Rahm had never three-putted more than once in a round. Entering the third round at Sentosa, he had only three-putted once in 2026. On Saturday, he three-putted three times.
SUCCESS IN THE REGION: All four players at the top of the leaderboard have won in Asia, demonstrating the importance of past success in the region.
Joaquin Niemann has won the PIF Saudi International as well as LIV Golf Singapore last year
Lee Westwood has won four times in Japan, three times in Indonesia, twice in Malaysia, twice in Thailand, twice in the UAE, once in Macau and once in South Korea
DeChambeau has won the Omega Dubai Desert Classic and LIV Golf Korea
Lee has won the Solaire Open in the Philippines, the Shinhan Donghae Open in South Korea and the BNI Indonesian Masters in Indonesia
“I think most of the golf courses on the Asian Tour we play on this type of grass out here. Some of where the pin placements are, I know if it’s into grain and it’s going to hit and stop or if it’s down grain, just keep it a little bit shorter, land it a little bit shorter and bounce it up. I think just playing on this course numerous times, I think I found out how it is, how it works,” said the Canadian Lee.
“I’ve always loved coming to Asia,” Westwood added. “I set my stall out the beginning of my career, coming to Malaysia and places like that. I went to Japan very early on in my career, 1994, for the Acom International, and then I played Visa Taiheiyos and Dunlop Phoenix and won three Visa Taiheiyos in a row and a Dunlop Phoenix back-to-back with the Visa. I won the Malaysian Open. One place I haven’t won is Singapore, so it would be nice to add that to the list.”
NIEMANN REFLECTS ON PAST LESSON: Last season, Joaquin Niemann won twice in his first four LIV Golf starts. This year, he’s finished T22-T12-T41 over his first three events. As he enters the final round with a share of the lead in Singapore, he reflected on advice he’d received early in his career that’s helped him deal with adversity.
“I always have something in mind just when I had my first year on the PGA Tour. I was having a practice round with one of the guys, and he was like, ‘I know you’re not going to ask me for any advice, but if I can give you one, it’s don’t worry if you’re having a bad day or a bad week or a few bad tournaments. Your best golf is always going to come back,’” Niemann recalled. ”I feel like that always stayed in my mind, and I feel like it’s true. If you keep doing the things you’re doing and you did it before and it works, you’ve just got to keep trying, and I know definitely it’s going to come.”
STREAKS END: In shooting an even par-71 on Saturday, Jon Rahm’s streak of 23 consecutive LIV Golf rounds under par came to an end. Sebastian Munoz’s streak of 58 par 3s in a row without a bogey ended Saturday on the 8th hole.
NOTES & NUGGETS
Cameron Smith birdied all four par 3s, just the third time a LIV Golf player has achieved that feat (Branden Grace, Rd. 1 in 2022 Bangkok; Sergio Garcia, Rd. 1 in 2024 Mayakoba)
Sergio Garcia shot the lowest round Saturday, a 6-under 65, and gained 6.105 strokes on the field – his best result in any round of his LIV Golf career
Garcia’s Fireballs GC shot a cumulative 11 under to lead the field – the first time they’ve shot the lowest single-round team score since the final round in Singapore last year, when they went on to win
As a team, the Fireballs gained 8.98 strokes on the green, the fourth most in a round
Jon Rahm hit 17 Greens in Regulation on Saturday, tying for his best result in any LIV Golf round
Richard T. Lee’s T3 is the best position a Wild Card has held leading entering the final round
Ripper GC’s Elvis Smylie had the only bogey-free round on Saturday, fueled by 7 of 7 in Scrambling
Crushers GC led overnight for the 16th time coming into Saturday, but the team’s final position of sixth after the round equals its worst finishing position for a round when starting with the lead
The field averaged 1.82 putts when hitting Greens in Regulation on Saturday; excluding the inaugural 2022 season, it’s the seventh-highest round in league history
Just 14 players hit the green at the par-4 third in Rd. 3, which makes it the hardest green to hit in 2026 and the 27th hardest in league history
STATS LEADERS
Round 3
Driving Distance: Josele Ballester, 334.9-yard avg.
Longest Drive: Josele Ballester, 375.0 yards (18th hole)
Driving Accuracy: Lee Westwood, Branden Grace, Harold Varner III, Wade Ormsby, Richard Bland, 85.71% (12 of 14)
Greens in Regulation: Jon Rahm, 94.44% (17 of 18)
Scrambling: Elvis Smylie (7 of 7), Sergio Garcia (4 of 4), Jason Kokrak (3 of 3), Jon Rahm (1 of 1), 100%
Fewest Putts: Dean Burmester, 22
Bogey-free rounds: Elvis Smylie (67)
Cumulative
Driving Distance: Josele Ballester, 321.7-yard avg.
Driving Accuracy: Joaquin Niemann, 80.95% (34 of 42)
Greens in Regulation: Jon Rahm, 87.04% (47 of 54)
Scrambling: Thomas Detry, 84.21% (16 of 19)
Fewest Putts: Dustin Johnson, 76
This piece is courtesy of Mike McAllister in partnership with LIV Golf.
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