German golfer Marcel Siem capped a miserable two weeks on the DP World Tour by getting disqualified from the BMW PGA Championship.
After a bad back forced the 45-year-old to withdraw from the first round of the Irish Open last week, he was disqualified from the Wentworth tournament after informing officials he had made an error on the 18th.
Siem lost his original tee shot out of bounds to the right, and then proceeded to take a provisional off the tee.
While about to address his fourth shot when a member of the public found his original tee shot near a water hazard.
Siem declared that ball ‘unplayable’ picked it up and continued on with the fourth shot with his provisional ball.
He finished with a birdie on the 18th, which became a bogey 6 after penalties were applied.
It was only when he returned to the scorer’s hut to sign his card that he realised his error and informed officials, at which point he was then disqualified for a rules violation.
Under Rule 27, once the original ball is found and is not out-of-bounds, the golfer is required to either play the original ball or take proper relief under hazard rules. Playing the provisional in that scenario is not allowed.
Siem took to social media after the event to explain the situation, firstly denying that he was a ‘cheat’.
“I just wanted to let you know I didn’t cheat,” Siem explained on Instagram. “I would never do that, so I got disqualified, unfortunately.
“On 18, I pushed my driver to the right, hit a provisional thinking it’s out of bounds on the right. Never knew it’s a water hazard on the right.
“Anyways, found my provisional. I was just about to hit my provisional, so my fourth shot, so to say, and one of the spectators found my ball, my first one.
“I walked in there, tired of the whole day already, and the ball was underneath the branch, couldn’t chip it out. I said, okay, this is unplayable. Picked the ball up, and then just stupidly hit my fourth shot.
“Just kept going, made birdie with my second ball, so to say, and made a bogey.”
Siem thought something was amiss when he went to sign his card, told the referee, and was then informed of his disqualification.
“I was just about to sign my card, and I just realised something is off here,” added Siem.
“I said ‘guys I dont think I made a six let’s call a referee’. I said, ‘dude, I think I made a mistake here, right? I’m supposed to go back to the 18th tee box and play my third shot, right?’ Because it’s water hazard, and if I declared as unplayable, I have to go back, and I cannot hit my provisional ball.
“So that was the case and I’m disqualified because of that.”
Siem was about to complete a grim round which saw him approach the final hole on five over. He’d bogeyed the first, third, fourth and ninth hole.
On the back nine, he’d birdied the 11th and 15th but they were rare highlights in a round where he collected seven bogeys before he had reached the final hole.
This is not the first time Siem has fallen foul of rule breaches. He withdraw from the Open de France in October 2019 for breaking rule 14.7a – playing a ball from a wrong place.
Siem had mistakenly believed preferred lies were in operation and had breached the rule on five occasions durint the first nine holes of the first round, which left him facing 10 penalty strokes. Rather than continue on, he withdrew.
“Suitably to the whole season I have now even better laid on the fairway and the whole 5 times. Then of course I played the ball from the wrong place and got 10 penalty shots. That was a little too much for me and I disqualified myself. I thought to myself, I owe you the explanation,” Siem posted on social media.
What rule did Marcel Siem break?
Rule 27‑2c When Provisional Ball to be Abandoned
If the original ball is neither lost nor out of bounds, the player must abandon the provisional ball and continue playing with the original ball.
If it is known or virtually certain that the original ball is in a water hazard, the player may proceed in accordance with Rule 26‑1.
In either situation, if the player makes any further strokes at the provisional ball, he is playing a wrong ball and the provisions of Rule 15‑3 apply.
From USGA Rules of Golf.
