Illawarra golfer Jordan Zunic's lucky escape

Jordan’s father Zoran said the accident happened in Little Rock, Arkansas at 1pm on Saturday.

Jordan, who had travelled to the Unites States close to three months ago to further his career, was a passenger in the back seat of the car, a white BMW.

Also in the car were fellow Australian amateur golfers, Viraat Badhwar and Ricky Kato.

‘‘They’d just finished lunch and were going through an intersection and someone’s just T-boned them,’’ Mr Zunic said.

MORE: Illawarra golfer Jordan Zunic in hospital

‘‘This old lady just went straight through and hit the car. The car was pushed into a pole and Jordan took the brunt of the pole to the head. Luckily it was a BMW because the side air bag pretty much saved his life.’’

Mr Zunic said Jordan was taken to hospital where doctors closed a minor temporal artery that was severed over his ear. A plastic surgeon was also able to repair damage done to Jordan’s ear.

Beyond that, Mr Zunic said the rest of the injuries were just bruising on the face and jaw.

‘‘At the moment there’s nothing life-threatening,’’ he said.

‘‘He thought he broke his hip initially but it’s just a bad bruise. Over the next few days he’s probably going to find a few more bruises than he thought he had.’’

The accident happened at a bad time as Jordan was scheduled to compete in the the prestigious US amateur championships next week. The winner of that tournament earns a start in next year’s US Masters.

However, Mr Zunic said that there was still a chance Jordan will be teeing off next week.

‘‘The funny thing is the doctor’s given him a 50-50 chance of playing the US Amateurs next week,’’ Mr Zunic said.

‘‘I said to Jordan ‘we’ll just take it a day at a time’ but Jordan’s just fully on - ‘I’ll be right, a couple of days in here and I’ll be getting out’.

‘‘It’s kind of good that he’s keeping positive - but he doesn’t realise what he’s sustained. I’ll give it to him, he’s a tough kid.’’