A sponsor agreement with car manufacturer
Saab Automobile made it possible for Persson and two of his teammates from the 1982 Eisenhower Trophy,
Ove Sellberg and
Krister Kinell, to turn professional and form Team Saab, granted support and financial possibilities to compete on the
European Tour. He successfully progressed through the 1982
European Tour Qualifying School, at La Manga, Spain, in November, finishing tied 7th and earned his first pay check. At the age of 17, he was the youngest player ever to win a European Tour card. In 1986, he won the
Swedish PGA Championship (that year named PGA Club Sweden Open) at a course, Lindö in
Stockholm at Björn Borg Sports Club, designed 10 years earlier by his father Åke Persson, one of Sweden's most respected golf course architects at the time. Persson would go on to win the same title for a second time 24 years later, at 45 years of age. Persson was twice a runner-up on the European Tour, losing in a sudden-death playoff on the sixth extra hole against
Gordon Brand Jnr at the
1987 Scandinavian Enterprise Open on home soil in Stockholm, Sweden and also losing out in a playoff at the
1990 Open Renault de Baleares on
Mallorca,
Spain, to
Seve Ballesteros. At the Mallorca tournament, Person led by five strokes before the last round and kept that lead with ten holes remaining, playing in the last group with Ballesteros. At the last hole Persson, still with a one-shot-advantage, found his ball plugged in a bunker, while Ballesteros' ball went playable despite a hooked drive into the gallery. Ballesteros went on to make a birdie and won the tournament in a sudden-death playoff. 1990 would become Perssons best season, finishing 30th on the
European Tour Order of Merit. He lost his card at the end of the 1991 season and struggled to regain it the following years. In 2001, on his 11th visit to the Qualifying School Finals in as many years, Persson regained his European Tour card. Persson won three times on the European
Challenge Tour, the first title coming in the
1992 Perrier European Pro-Am at Brussels Golf Club,
Belgium, the second in the
1993 Torneo Istantilla Golf, at Islantilla Golf Club,
Huelva,
Spain and the third in the
1998 Is Molas Challenge at Is Molas Golf Club in
Sardinia,
Italy. In 2009, Persson became Tournament Director of the
Swedish Golf Tour, at the time named the
Nordea Tour. He also started to branch out into golf course design, having created one course in Sweden and one in
Finland together with his architect father. In
2018, he finished runner-up at the
Staysure PGA Seniors Championship, the oldest important seniors tournament in Europe, before winning the
European Tour Properties Senior Classic. ==Amateur wins==