Justin Rose is European golf’s new number one, eight years on from looking like he might never make it as a professional.

But how Rose had to work the Volvo Masters as well at Valderrama today, going from four clear to one behind before beating Simon Dyson and Soren Kjeldsen with a 14-foot birdie putt on the second hole of a sudden death play-off.

Rose, still an amateur and only 17 when he came a magical fourth in the 1998 Open, began his pro career with an unbelievable 21 successive missed cuts and had to wait 11 months to earn his first penny on the course.

But today he leapt from third to first on the Order of Merit with over £2million with a victory which also takes him into the world’s top 10 for the first time.

“I am emotional right now,” he said. “It was a hard day. I looked like losing and dug deep.

“I’m sure there’s an easy way to do this stuff, but it was terrible. I made a couple of mental errors and even saw the Order of Merit slipping away.

“It’s awesome to do it. Knowing that I had was a nice consolation going into the play-off, but I wanted to do it by winning the tournament.

“It’s been a long road to get here. You need to win tournaments to be regarded as a great player and it would have been very disappointing if I hadn’t won this.”

It was his first victory since the Australian Masters last November.

With Padraig Harrington coming “only” fourth in his bid to keep his money list title - he had to be third to have a chance - Rose is now seventh in the world rankings just ahead of the Open champion.

Four strokes clear after the second and third rounds, the 27-year-old still held that advantage after 10 holes and was making the task appear no harder than a walk in the park.

But suddenly things went haywire. In two bunkers down the long 11th he ran up a double bogey seven, then dropped further shots on the 13th and 14th.

It was bad enough that he fell into a tie, but then Kjeldsen birdied the 17th to lead on his own minutes after playing Graeme McDowell had holed a 176-yard seven-iron for only the second albatross there in the tournament’s history.

Sadly McDowell, having momentarily taken a share of the lead himself, then double-bogeyed the last to fall into a tie for fourth with Harrington.

Rose, helped by a lucky bounce out of the trees, parred the 16th and when he and Dyson both birdied the downwind 17th they were tied at two under.

However, neither made the green in three let alone two at the last and bogey fives gave Kjeldsen another chance.

After all had parred the 18th when the play-off started they went to the adjoining 10th and with Kjeldsen missing from 18 feet Rose’s birdie putt ended his hopes.

Dyson was only 12 feet away but his putt to stay alive just missed and Rose grabbed the £467,644 winner’s cheque along with everything else that came with it.

The first prize swept him past not only Harrington, but also Ernie Els, who rather than trying for a third money list crown honoured a commitment to play in Singapore instead.

Collated final round scores & totals in the European Tour Volvo Masters, Club de Golf Valderrama, Sotogrande, Cadiz, Spain

(Gbr & Irl unless stated, par 71):

283 Justin Rose 70 68 71 74(Rose won play-off at 2nd hole)

Soren Kjeldsen (Den) 73 70 73 67, Simon Dyson 74 70 69 70

285 Graeme McDowell 68 75 74 68, Padraig Harrington 71 71 71 72

288 Martin Kaymer (Ger) 72 78 66 72

289 Miguel Angel Jimenez (Spa) 73 70 77 69

290 Ian Poulter 76 71 69 74

291 Thomas Bjorn (Den) 76 73 70 72, Jyoti Randhawa (Ind) 73 70 74 74

292 Robert Karlsson (Swe) 77 70 71 74

293 Anthony Wall 73 74 72 74, Paul McGinley 69 75 74 75

294 Peter Hanson (Swe) 75 72 74 73, Ross Fisher 71 80 71 72, Alex Cejka (Ger) 78 70 70 76

295 Francesco Molinari (Ita) 75 71 76 73, Colin Montgomerie 72 73 71 79, Markus Brier (Aut) 76 72 74 73, Raphael Jacquelin (Fra) 71 73 79 72

296 Oliver Wilson 74 75 71 76

298 Niclas Fasth (Swe) 75 70 76 77, Gonzalo Fdez-Castano (Spa) 74 75 76 73, Peter Hedblom (Swe) 77 72 78 71

300 Jeev Milkha Singh (Ind) 76 74 74 76, Anders Hansen (Den) 72 77 75 76, Soren Hansen (Den) 75 74 70 81, Nick Dougherty 75 76 73 76, Simon Wakefield 75 74 77 74, Paul Casey 80 73 72 75, Brett Rumford (Aus) 73 74 75 78, Andres Romero (Arg) 76 76 78 70, Peter O’Malley (Aus) 70 75 75 80

301 Sergio Garcia (Spa) 77 72 73 79, Luke Donald 72 75 76 78, Gregory Bourdy (Fra) 75 72 77 77, Richard Sterne (Rsa) 75 70 78 78

302 Robert Jan Derksen (Ned) 73 77 81 71, Yong-eun Yang (Kor) 74 74 78 76, Alastair Forsyth 75 73 77 77, Henrik Stenson (Swe) 76 78 71 77

304 Marc Warren 82 75 71 76, Pelle Edberg (Swe) 79 73 74 78, Mark Foster 76 78 76 74

305 Phillip Archer 76 78 74 77

306 Steve Webster 79 74 78 75

307 Fredrik Andersson Hed (Swe) 81 74 80 72, Graeme Storm 81 74 77 75, Simon Khan 75 79 79 74

308 Mikko Ilonen (Fin) 83 72 78 75, Bradley Dredge 75 72 83 78, Thongchai Jaidee (Tha) 73 78 80 77

309 Gregory Havret (Fra) 83 73 76 77

315 Sandy Lyle 84 81 72 78

Order Of Merit:

JUSTIN ROSE

Position: 1st, Money: £2,065,801, Events: 12, Wins: 2 (MasterCard Masters, Volvo Masters), Top 3: 5, Top 10: 9, Missed cuts: 0, To par: 35 under.

ERNIE ELS

Position: 2nd, Money: £1,751,045, Events: 18, Wins: 2 (South African Airways Open, HSBC World Match Play), Top 3: 6, Top 10: 12, Missed cuts: 1, To par: 86 under.

PADRAIG HARRINGTON

Position: 3rd, Money: £1,728,250, Events: 15, Wins: 2 (Irish Open, Open Championship), Top 3: 3, Top 10: 8, Missed cuts: 1, To par: 16 under.

Source - www.sportinglife.com