Anirban Lahiri took a giant leap on Monday.

A career-best prize money of $2.18 million — that is more than Rs 16.65cr, which is the highest-ever earning by an Indian in individual sport — and going north by 233 places in the world rankings from an abysmal 322 to 89 — Lahiri is basking in glory, also breaking into the top-100 for the first time since August 2018. Now majors beckon the Pune-born golfer.

Yes, he could have been the second Indian to win on the PGA Tour after Arjun Atwal (Wyndham Championship in 2010), but what the India golfer achieved is nonetheless spectacular.

Going into the final round with a one-shot lead, Lahiri fell short by a stroke to end runner-up in the last round of the Players Championship at the Ponte Vedra Beach.

Lahiri (69) needed a birdie on the 18th hole, the 72nd of the tournament, to force a play-off with Aussie Cameron Smith. Smith carded 66 and totalled 13-under while Lahiri ended at 12-under after a birdie on the 17th and a par on the 18th.

It was the 34-year-old’s second career runner-up finish following the 2017 Memorial Tournament and pushed him up to 45th position from 209 on the FedExCup after picking up 330 points.

“I want to win. I’ve been here for seven years; haven’t gotten over the line yet. That’s definitely a monkey I want to get off my back. Today (Monday) was as good an opportunity as any,” he said.

Smith was superb on Monday with 10 birdies against three bogeys through 17 holes but opened the door with what turned out to be a winning bogey after finding water on the 18th hole with his second shot.

“I guess at one point on the 16th hole, I thought it was kind of out of reach, but then again, birdying 17, Cam (Smith) kind of opened the door. I gave it a good go. Made some mistakes that I could have avoided, but that’s golf. I picked up a few shots too, so I’m happy. This is a really positive week for me going forward,” said Lahiri, who had a 67-73-67-69 score at The Players, said.

“I hit such a good drive (on 18). The ball was above my feet, which is like a hook or a draw lie. It was pretty simple really and I just needed to stand pretty much where my ball ended up, stand there and just make a swing and let the slope and the wind do the job for me. Like a few other things today, I didn’t turn through it, and I kind of hung it out a little bit and it didn’t come back. That was disappointing, because I couldn’t have put myself in a better position.”

Although his final approach shot failed to find the green, one area of improvement which Lahiri was pleased about was his iron play.

“I’m just relieved. I’ve gone through two years of playing horrible. The last time I contended in a field this good was at Memorial maybe, five years ago, or even that was a back-door second. I shot 7-under on Sunday. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in this position in a quality field like this,” he said.

“It’s huge, because when you go through such a lean period for such a long time, you start asking yourself, ‘man, was that a flash in the pan? What are you doing? You haven’t played good in so long.’ Your belief takes a hit, so this for me is — ‘I’m going to re-cement the foundation and work upwards from here’.”

Lahiri grabbing headlines is nothing new though. Almost 10 years back, he made people sit up and take notice of him with a hole-in-one in the third round of the British Open. At that time he was an unknown 25-year-old.

After the Players, he would be ‘followed’. That’s for sure.