The Maybank Championship is being contested for a third straight year at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and the field is pretty strong considering there were several athletes who teed it up in the Hanwha LIFEPLUS International Crown last week, one of the two biennial team competitions that are held every other year on the LPGA Tour. Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul is part of that group, and she is joined by athletes like LPGA Hall of Famer Lydia Ko, two-time LPGA Tour winner Angel Yin and defending champion Ruoning Yin at the Maybank Championship, among others, after playing for their respective countries or as a member of the World Team in the Republic of Korea at New Korea Country Club.

Using KPMG Performance Insights data, take a deeper look at just a couple of the featured groups this week who will be taking on the first round together in Malaysia.

Thursday, 9:16 a.m. – Rio Takeda/Lydia Ko/Angel Yin

Three of the LPGA Tour’s 27 different 2025 champions will tee it up together in round one of the Maybank Championship. Japanese rookie Rio Takeda picked up her second career victory at the Blue Bay LPGA in March, but because she won the 2024 TOTO Japan Classic as a non-member and deferred the immediate membership she was offered to the next year, she is still considered to be the season’s second Rolex First-Time Winner after Yealimi Noh. Takeda has only skipped one event this year, and in her 26 total starts ahead of this week, she has collected seven other top 10s along with her victory, the most recent of which came in the Republic of Korea when she tied for 10th at the BMW Ladies Championship a couple of weeks ago. This is the rookie’s debut appearance at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club, one that comes off the heels of her first start in the Hanwha LIFEPLUS International Crown, as Takeda competed as a member of the Japan Team, who finished fourth at New Korea Country Club. According to KPMG Performance Insights data, the 22-year-old is first on the LPGA Tour in greens in regulation (76.8 percent), third in both greens in regulation after a missed fairway (60.1 percent) and strokes gained approach (+1.18) and fourth in proximity to the hole from 150 to 175 yards (28 feet 3 inches). Takeda is additionally leading the LPGA Tour in strokes gained tee to green (+1.95), sub-par rounds (67), birdies (452), rounds in the 60s (42) and ball striking (3). She is currently second in the Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the Year race with 1131 points, 61 points behind AIG Women’s Open champion Miyu Yamashita, and, like the major champion, Takeda is working to become the first Japanese rookie to win the award since 1990.

Lydia Ko notched her 23rd victory on the LPGA Tour at the HSBC Women’s World Championship in Singapore, what was her first win since she captured the Kroger Queen City Championship presented by P&G title in 2024. Ko hasn’t played the Maybank Championship since she tied for 11th in 2023, but she is making her 15th start of the 2025 season this week in Malaysia and is looking for her first top-10 result since she tied for fifth at the CPKC Women’s Open in August. The Rolex Rankings No. 4’s year-long statistics have her leading the Tour in one-putts per round according to KPMG Performance Insights data, holing an average of 7.43 putts each round on the first try. The 28-year-old LPGA Hall of Famer is in the top 10 of three major strokes gained metrics, ranking third in strokes gained around the green (+0.46), fifth in strokes gained putting (+1.06) and ninth in strokes gained total (+1.68). She is also second in scrambling, third in putts per round (28.80) and tied for third in putts per hole (1.60).

Angel Yin became a two-time LPGA Tour winner at the Honda LPGA Thailand during the spring Asian swing, beating Japan’s Akie Iwai by one stroke after posting a four-day total of 28-under at Siam Country Club’s Pattaya Old Course. This is her 18th event of the 2025 LPGA Tour season, and in addition to that win, Yin has carded five other top-10 results, the most recent of which came at The Amundi Evian Championship in July. She hasn’t done much of note in her previous two starts in the Maybank Championship, withdrawing from play in 2023 and then tying for 35th in 2024. But Yin, who comes to Malaysia off a strong performance as part of the United States Team at the Hanwha LIFEPLUS International Crown, is primed to improve upon those results this week at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club. According to KPMG Performance Insights, the 27-year-old Californian is the only player to rank inside the top 10 of strokes gained putting in each of the last three seasons, as Yin currently sits at sixth in that metric (+0.96) after finishing first (+1.40) and fourth (+0.95) in 2023 and 2024, respectively. Otherwise, Yin’s statistics are fairly middle-of-the-pack at this point in 2025, even though she has played some strong, consistent golf this year on Tour.

Thursday, 9:27 a.m. – Celine Boutier/Jeeno Thitikul/Ruoning Yin

The first two Maybank Championship winners will go alongside the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings No. 1 in group 25 on Thursday at the Maybank Championship. Celine Boutier won the inaugural edition of this event in 2023 in a thrilling nine-hole playoff with Jeeno Thitikul at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club, nine extra holes that tied the second-longest playoff in LPGA Tour history. It was the fourth and final win of a banner season for Boutier, as she had also collected titles at the LPGA Drive On Championship, The Amundi Evian Championship and the ISPS HANDA Women’s Scottish Open. The Frenchwoman hasn’t found the winner’s circle again on the LPGA Tour since that triumph in Malaysia, but she has finished in the top 10 nine times over the previous two years, five of which have come in the 20 tournaments in which she has played this season. The 31-year-old tied for third in her last LPGA Tour start at the BMW Ladies Championship in the Republic of Korea, what was her fourth time finishing in the top five in 2025, momentum that Boutier will work to keep rolling at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club. This is her third straight appearance in the Maybank Championship, and along with her victory, Boutier put a T12 showing on her resume in Malaysia in 2024. According to KPMG Performance Insights data, the six-time LPGA Tour winner is ranked inside the top 20 in both strokes gained approach (16, +0.67) and strokes gained total (19, +1.27) this season. She is additionally tied for fifth in bogey-free rounds (9) and tied for sixth in rounds in the 60s (33).

Rolex Rankings No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul will be looking to finally break through at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club, having finished runner-up in the Maybank Championship in both 2023 and 2024 to each of her first-round groupmates. She fell in a playoff to Celine Boutier in the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2023 and then lost to her close friend Ruoning Yin by one stroke in 2024. The 22-year-old is the only multiple winner on the LPGA Tour this season, picking up two victories at the Mizuho Americas Open and the Buick LPGA Shanghai. She has also tallied 10 additional top-10 results in her 18 total starts in 2025, four of which are T2s or better that came at the HSBC Women’s World Championship (T2), The Amundi Evian Championship (2), the FM Championship (2) and the Kroger Queen City Championship presented by P&G (2). Looking at KPMG Performance Insights data, Thitikul has the best cumulative score to par in the Maybank Championship since it joined the LPGA Tour schedule in 2023 at 43-under, nine strokes better than her next closest competitor, Ruoning Yin at 34-under. In terms of her 2025 statistics, Thitikul is unsurprisingly at the top of the rankings in several key metrics on the LPGA Tour this year, most notably sitting at first in strokes gained total (+2.99), scoring average (68.95), birdie or better percentage (27.23 percent), top-10 finishes (12) and bogey avoidance (10.93 percent). The Thailand native is also leading every season-long award race for which she is eligible to win, including the Race to the CME Globe (3,439.950 points), Rolex Player of the Year (162 points), Vare Trophy (68.95) and the Aon Risk Reward Challenge (-0.938). She is currently second on the Official Money List ($3,470,095).

People’s Republic of China native Ruoning Yin won the 2024 edition of the Maybank Championship and will be working to successfully defend a title for the first time in her LPGA Tour career this week at Kuala Lumpur Golf and Country Club. She triumphed by one stroke over Jeeno Thitikul to tally what was her fifth career victory and third win of the 2024 season, as Yin had also won the Dow Championship alongside Thitikul and captured the Buick LPGA Shanghai title in her home country. This is her 15th tournament of 2025, and in her 14 previous starts, the 23-year-old has recorded three top-five results, including back-to-back ties for second that came at The Chevron Championship and the Black Desert Championship presented by Greater Zion and a tie for fourth that she posted at the U.S. Women’s Open presented by Ally at Erin Hills. In addition to her victory in Malaysia, Yin also finished in a tie for 17th in this event back in 2023. Statistically, the major champion is ranked inside the top 25 in four major strokes gained categories this year, according to KPMG Performance Insights. She is eighth in strokes gained approach (+0.79), 10th in strokes gained tee to green (+1.23), 16th in strokes gained total (+1.41) and 25th in strokes gained off the tee (+0.46). Yin is also 10th in scrambling on the LPGA Tour in 2025, getting up and down 63.22 percent of the time after missing a green.

All times local. For a full list of tee times, please click here. For more information on how to watch the Maybank Championship, please click here.

Featured Groups: 2025 Maybank Championship

Related Articles