Alvaro Quiros defeated Zander Lombard in a play-off to cap a stunning return to form and win his seventh European Tour title at The Rocco Forte Open - Verdura, Sicily.
The Spaniard's last win had come in 2011 and he had dropped to 703rd in the Official World Golf Ranking and lost his playing privileges since, deciding to focus on the Challenge Tour in 2017.
A brilliant week in Italy, however, meant he regained his European Tour privileges and moved into the top 250 in the world after a par on the second trip back up the last handed him victory.
Quiros entered the final round with a five-shot lead and extended it by a further two after six holes as he looked set to romp home but dropped five shots on the back nine.
He and Lombard parred the first play-off hole and both looked set to do the same second time around, but the South African agonisingly missed a short putt to allow Quiros to tap home for the win.
The 34 year old had spoken during the week of taking his game back to its fundamentals after making major changes in 2012.
"I'm very happy," he said. "Obviously it shouldn't be like that but at the end it's a victory and that's the most important thing.
"It's been a little bit of a mess.The game wasn't that bad. Just the last few holes I started to struggle with the wind left to right and he was playing nice, Pep was playing nice too.
"I didn't have an idea how many shots I was leading by, what I knew on 18 is I have to make a putt to halve with Zander.
"It's a victory, it means a lot of things."
