Golf can be a cruel game and on Friday at the WGC - Dell Technologies Match Play it was particularly cruel to Tyrrell Hatton.
The Englishman had completed Group 10 with two wins and a loss to earn a place in a play-off against Rafa Cabrera Bello and Charles Howell III and had a short par putt on the first that would have kept his campaign alive.
He accidentally hit the ball as he was lining up and, after conversing with Cabrera Bello, tapped in his putt and walked off believing his chance had gone.
Unfortunately for the World Number 14, had he spoken to a local rules official, he would have been able to replace the ball with no penalty after an accidental movement and had his par chance.
"What happens is he placed his putter on the ground behind the ball and it caused the ball to move and then he putted it from the new position," said local official Steve Carman.
"Well we have a local rule in effect that if it's an accidental movement on the putting green, there is no penalty and you replace the ball.
"So he didn't replace the ball, so he's played from the wrong place, so there's a two-stroke penalty."
Without a doubt I'm going to make mistakes, as I've done today. And I've just got to try to pick myself back up - Tyrrell Hatton
A lesson Hatton is unlikely to forget.
"It's probably the worst way it could have ended," he said. "It's just one of those things. The referee said 'did I replace the ball?'. Because if I'd replaced it then I wouldn't have gotten the penalty but, obviously, by then it was too late and I'd knocked the putt in.
"Without a doubt I'm going to make mistakes, as I've done today. And I've just got to try to pick myself back up and hopefully I can have a good week at the Masters."
