Miyazaki, Japan: Since the turn of the century, Ai Miyazato, Tseng Ya-ni, Feng Shanshan, Lydia Ko, Ryu So-yeon, Kim Hyo-joo, Minjee Lee, Hannah Green, Yuka Saso, Patty Tavatanakit and Atthaya ‘Jeeno’ Thitikul are among the Asia-Pacific players who have distinguished themselves on the LPGA Tour.
As well as establishing themselves as elite performers in the women’s professional game, there’s another common denominator between them – all starred for their countries in the Queen Sirikit Cup while still amateurs.
The latest teenage prodigy who’s being tipped to follow in their footsteps is Oh Soo-min.
The rangy, 16-year-old Korean underlined her status as one of the hottest properties in women’s amateur golf with an emphatic triumph in the 45th edition of the Queen Sirikit Cup, also known as the Amateur Ladies Asia-Pacific Invitational Golf Team Championship.
It wasn’t just the fact that she raced to an 11-stroke success in the individual category that impressed, but also the manner in which she did it, dismantling the Tom Watson Golf Course at the Phoenix Seagaia Resort with a potent mixture of power and poise.
In compiling rounds of 69, 67, 62 and a closing 69, Oh simultaneously brought the tree-lined course to its knees and left her high-class rivals trailing distantly in her wake.
To those who have followed her rise to prominence over the past 18 months, her dominant performance was not a surprise, but an endorsement of a mercurial talent for whom the sky appears to be the limit.
In 2024, Oh won five titles, commencing with her first Queen Sirikit Cup individual title in New Zealand in March, where she also led Korea to another team triumph.
She followed up by winning the Dolmen Cup Amateur Golf Championship on home soil in her next start, went on to complete the double of Korean Women’s Amateur and Korean Junior victories and romped to an eight-shot success in the World Junior Girls Championship in Canada.
The next week, just over a month after her 16th birthday, Oh claimed a share of 23rd place at the BMW Ladies Championship, finishing ahead of defending champion Minjee Lee, then world number two Lilia Vu and a host of other LPGA Tour stars.
It was further proof that the Korean schoolgirl, who has been as high as seventh in the World Amateur Golf Ranking, is destined to be the next superstar from a country overflowing with talented young golfers.
Although injury prompted her to withdraw from the Asia-Pacific Golf Confederation team that defeated the European Golf Association in the Solheim Cup-style Patsy Hankins Trophy in the United Arab Emirates in January, Oh was soon back to her best.
In March she finished runner-up to Malaysian Jeneath Wong in the Women’s Amateur Asia-Pacific in Vietnam and was equal third in the Junior Invitational at Sage Valley in the United States.
Undeterred by missing the cut at the Augusta National Women’s Amateur at the start of April, Oh warmed up for her Queen Sirikit Cup title defence by placing joint third at the Taiwan Amateur Championship, won by her Queen Sirikit Cup team-mate Jung Min-seo.
Oh's delight at being back in the winners’ enclosure in Japan was clear.
“I’m proud of our team, and I’m also very happy to have won the championship twice in a row. I’m so grateful to have made it,” she said. "This year, I haven’t had any tournaments in Korea yet, and I hadn’t won any overseas events either. I’m really happy to have been able to win here in Japan."
While speculation swirls as to her future plans, Oh has indicated that she’s in no particular hurry to relinquish her amateur status.
“I do want to play professionally one day. But there is no rush. I still enjoy school, and playing in amateur events, and there is an age limit of 18 imposed by the LPGA and the Korean LPGA,” said Oh.
That’s good news for the Korean Golf Association who will be looking to Oh to anchor the team that will defend the Women’s World Amateur Team Championship title for the Espirito Santo Trophy in Singapore in early October.
