Matteo Manassero's emergence was one of the most spectacular of any player this century, but he was unable to sustain some record-breaking form and eventually found himself in the golfing wilderness.
Since then, the talented Italian has proved that you simply can't keep this potentially great player down, and he burst back into the spotlight in 2024 while still aged just 31.
Here are 20 facts you may not be aware of about the DP World Tour professional.
1. Matteo Manassero was born in Negrar, Italy on 16 April 1993.
2. Manassero began playing golf at the age of three, and was later nurtured by former DP World Tour professional Alberto Binaghi.
3. His progress was rapid and, in 2008, he played for Team Europe at the Junior Ryder Cup.
4. In 2009, he became the youngest winner of The Amateur.
5. That handed him an exemption to that year’s Open, where he was grouped with Tom Watson and Sergio Garcia in the opening two rounds. He made the cut, and eventually won the Silver Medal as leading amateur with a finish of T13.
6. Manassero ended a stellar year at the top of the World Amateur Golf Rankings.
7. The records continued to fall in 2010. In April, he became the youngest player to make the cut at The Masters at the age of 16 years, 11 months and 22 days. Manassero finished T36 at Augusta National (although Guan Tianlang surpassed that achievement in 2013).
8. Two weeks before turning 17, Manassero announced he was turning professional.
9. He joined the European Tour (now the DP World Tour) and became the second-youngest player in the circuit’s history behind Seve Ballesteros.
10. Manassero’s first start as a professional came in his homeland at the Italian Open, where he finished T29.
11. That October, he broke yet another record when he became the youngest winner in the Tour’s history following victory in the Castelló Masters Costa Azahar, aged 17 years, 188 days.
12. Also in 2010, he was named the Sir Henry Cotton Rookie of the Year.
13. He added the Maybank Malaysian Open title in 2011, two days before turning 18, then in November 2012, he beat Louis Oosthuizen to the Barclays Singapore Open title while still a teenager.
14. In May 2013, Manassero claimed victory at the Tour’s flagship event, the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth. Naturally, that broke another record as he became its youngest winner at the age of 20.
15. That win secured him playing privileges on the circuit for the next five years and, soon after, he reached a career-high world ranking of 25th.
16. Manassero’s game then entered a long period of decline, with his next professional win not coming until September 2020, when he won the Toscana Alps Open on the developmental Alps Tour.
17. Three years later, he won twice on the Challenge Tour to return to the DP World Tour for 2024.
18. Manassero’s wife, Francesca, caddied for him on both occasions.
19. After a gap of 3,942 days, Manassero won on the circuit once again at the Jonsson Workwear Open, helped by a career-low 61 in the second round.
20. In June that year, Manassero’s qualification for the Olympics men’s tournament in Paris was confirmed.
