Padraig Harrington began the new European Tour season in perfect fashion with an exciting one-shot victory at the BMW Asian Open in Taiwan.

The Irishman shot a last-round 69 for a 15-under-par total of 273, one better than India's Jyoti Randhawa, for his sixth tour title.

The win leaves him 250,000 US dollars better off - rocketing him straight to the top of the 2003 Order of Merit after what was officially the first counting event.

But 31-year-old, who began the final day a shot behind Maarten Lafeber, had to overcome a late case of the jitters to seal his second win of the year, after his Dunhill Links Championship win in October.

In control and seemingly strolling to victory, Harrington contrived to almost throw all his hard work away, first finding water off the 16th tee with a 314-yard three-wood.

He managed to get up and down for a par there but then left a straightforward chip shot 20 feet short on the next, from where he could only make bogey.

That left him with just a one-shot cushion playing the 18th, a very difficult par three at the best of times, and he looked to be stumbling towards a play-off when he blocked a six iron right of the green.

A mediocre chip then left him with a 10-foot putt up the hill effectively for the title, and after the ball scraped into the hole with virtually its last roll the relief felt by Harrington, who knows more than most the disappointment of a runner-up, was plain to see.

Afterwards he revealed his late slip had been triggered by breaking one of his golden rules.

He said: "It was only when I got to the 15th green that I looked at the scoreboard - I don't watch scoreboards at all but I looked because my round had got a little bit static and I was looking for something to get it going.

"Unfortunately it had the reverse effect and all of a sudden I got defensive.

"Before I looked at the board I was thinking I would need to get to 17 or 18 under but then I saw the nearest to me was on 14, so that's probably why I became defensive. It can be very dangerous to watch scoreboards!"

Harrington had seized the early initiative with birdies at the second, fifth, sixth and seventh to open up a three-shot gap before being pegged back by a bogey at the ninth.

He bounced straight back though with a birdie at the next and then parred in before his late blip.

And Harrington, who was forced to play a left-handed eight iron when restricted by a tree on the ninth - the second such shot he has played in the last three weeks after encountering a similar problem at the Volvo Masters - felt his winning putt would give him much confidence in the future.

He added: "Most tournaments end with someone having two putts to win on the last - you don't often get the opportunity to hole a putt to win - and I did walk up to the putt thinking 'now here's your opportunity to go for glory'.

"It was nice to hole it and it'll be good for confidence in the future - I certainly willed it in for the last roll up the hill."

But he dismissed that, only three weeks after failing in his bid to overtake Retief Goosen in the race for the 2002 Order of Merit title, next year's money list was much of a priority yet.

"It wasn't really a question of coming out to try and win next year's Order of Merit - it was more a case of let's get out here and show some form and try and win the BMW Asian Open.

"We're so long away from the winner of the 2003 Order of Merit - it's been in my head for three weeks so I can't be thinking about it for 10 months!"

Harrington's nervy finish almost completed an extraordinary recovery for Randhawa, who after starting the day seven shots off the pace fired a flawless, eight-under-par 64 to storm up the leaderboard.

The 30-year-old had led the tournament after his first-day 65, but after slipping back with rounds of 75 and 70 was back to his best as he sunk four birdies in each nine.

It was a familiar story for Lafeber though, three shots back on 12-under 276 after a 73, who has now failed to win any of the three events in the past six weeks - after the Lancome Trophy and the Madrid Open - he has led at the halfway stage.

South African Trevor Immelman, who had looked in superb form all week, could hardly keep out of trouble and finished on 12 under after a 72, alongside American Andrew Pitts, followed by Thailand's Thongchai Jaidee on 11 under with Welshman Ian Woosnam finishing a shot back in joint seventh.

Final round scores

(Gbr & Irl unless stated, par 72):

273 P Harrington 66 70 68 69

274 J Randhawa (Ind) 65 75 70 64

276 A Pitts (USA) 67 70 69 70, M Lafeber (Ned) 66 66 71 73, T Immelman (Rsa) 69 67 68 72

277 T Jaidee (Tha) 71 67 70 69 278 S Hansen (Den) 71 68 70 69, I Woosnam 71 69 68 70, D Chopra (Swe) 71 73 67 67, R Gibson (Can) 72 69 69 68

279 A Atwal (Ind) 72 73 69 65, WS Kang (Kor) 74 68 68 69

280 H Nystrom (Swe) 67 75 67 71, G Hanrahan (USA) 73 72 68 67, T Oh (Kor) 71 71 68 70, S Yates 67 71 71 71

281 D Robertson 70 74 71 66, K Felton (Aus) 69 72 70 70, J Kingston (Rsa) 68 70 71 72

282 B Lane 70 69 74 69, S Torrance 73 67 72 70, A Percey (Aus) 68 69 73 72

283 M Farry (Fra) 70 73 70 70, D Park 69 74 71 69, J Sandelin (Swe) 67 74 70 72, WT Yeh (Tpe) 69 71 74 69, K Ferrie 71 70 73 69, S Hurd 71 70 75 67

284 JF Lucquin (Fra) 69 73 72 70, A Coltart 72 71 71 70, J Daly (USA) 70 74 70 70, D Terblanche (Rsa) 67 75 73 69, A Singh (Ind) 68 70 73 73

285 A Forsyth 73 71 70 71, P Sjoland (Swe) 72 71 71 71, S Struver (Ger) 66 74 72 73, S Kjeldsen (Den) 71 70 73 71

286 P del Olmo (Mex) 72 71 72 71, D Fung (Hkg) 71 73 71 71, V Kumar (Ind) 71 74 70 71, JM Olazabal (Spa) 73 72 70 71, J Lomas 72 71 73 70, J van Hauwe (Fra) 68 74 76 68, J Spence 71 73 73 69

287 MA Jimenez (Spa) 73 69 77 68, K Na (Kor) 71 67 74 75

288 C Wi (Kor) 70 72 77 69, P Baker 71 71 75 71, A Kang (Kor) 69 71 75 73

289 TC Wang (Tpe) 73 72 74 70, M Ilonen (Fin) 71 70 77 71, R Ponce (Ecu) 70 72 75 72, T Purdy (USA) 71 72 74 72

290 JE Morgan 74 70 79 67, T Wiratchant (Tha) 70 72 76 72, CH Chung (Tpe) 73 72 73 72

291 TC Chen (Tpe) 72 73 72 74, Peter Lawrie 71 72 72 76, S Ishigaki (Jpn) 71 72 72 76

292 S Dodd 71 73 76 72

293 G Rusnak (USA) 73 72 77 71, F Jacobsen (Swe) 75 70 75 73, C Devers (USA) 71 72 75 75, AD Bateman (Can) 72 72 73 76

295 T Srirot (Tha) 73 71 73 78

300 M Cunning (USA) 72 72 79 77