Best bets
2pts each-way Rasmus Hojgaard @ 14/1
2pts each-way Tommy Fleetwood @ 11/2
1pt each-way Thorbjorn Olesen @ 18/1
0.5pt each-way Nathan Kimsey @ 40/1
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With his mind clear after quitting as player-spokesman for the beleaguered PGA Tour and climbing down from his lofty “too judgmental” perch as chief critic of the LIV regime, Rory McIlroy can finally concentrate 100 per cent on actually playing the game for which he possesses such a uniquely thrilling talent.
Hard to believe but 2024 marks the tenth anniversary of his last Major triumph, the 2014 USPGA Championship, less than a month after he blitzed the Open at Hoylake. Four Majors in the bag, world No. 1 and only 25 – who would have bet a decade later the charismatic Northern Irishman would still be seeking No. 5?
If you think the long drought will end this year, note that on May 16 the PGA Championship returns to the Kentucky course where Rory ruled in 2014 and Fitzdares are laying 10/1 a Valhalla encore, a price that could look tasty if McIlroy makes an electrifying start to 2024 by pulling off the Dubai double in the next two weeks.
Teeing off the first DP World Tour action on Thursday is a new tournament, the Dubai Invitational, a $2.5m limited-field warm-up to the $9m main event, the long-established Dubai Desert Classic at the Emirates, and Rory of course will be favourite for both.
This week’s task, with only 59 to beat at the Dubai Creek course in the centre of the city, is the easier as Open champion Brian Harman, Tyrrell Hatton, Adam Scott and Cameron Young will be flying in next week to poop defending champion McIlroy‘s party as he bids to win a fourth Desert Classic.
Yet the opposition this week at Dubai Creek is sturdy enough to provide Rory with enough problems to put this punter off lumping on at a miserly 5/2. Tommy Fleetwood makes the 20-hour, 8600-mile trip from Hawaii to take on his Ryder Cup pal, crossing 14 time-zones in the process, after getting the rust out of his game at Kapalua in The Sentry tournament won by 150/1 shot Chris Kirk.
He was only 47th, not an ideal preparation while McIlroy was working on his game at Dubai Creek, the second course built in the UAE back in 1993 and twice host to the Desert Classic back at the turn of the century when the winners were David Howell and Jose Coceres, neither big hitters but more than handy on and around the green.
With neat-and-tidy Paul McGinley second and third, the evidence points to this 7059-yard par 71, with the creek and man-made water hazards as its chief defence, being best suited to accurate positional players rather than Rory-type bombers. So this may well be tougher for McIlroy than the Emirates, where he is a proven master.
It is far more a Fleetwood course – the Southport star, top ten in the last two Majors, then third at St Jude and sixth at the Tour Championship, looks a shoo-in for a place – than a McIlroy course or other power men like Nicolai Hojgaard and Adrian Meronk. There are no flashy 600-yard par fives or 500-yard par fours to give the big hitters an edge.
Danes Thorbjorn Olesen and Hojgaard’s less flamboyant twin Rasmus, with their smart iron play and good course management, seem far more suited and I particularly like their chances because they finished 2023 on an upswing with their best form shown at the end of the campaign.
After a year when injury robbed Rasmus of joining his brother on the Ryder Cup team, he produced tip-top efforts in November with sixth at the Nedbank and 11th at the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai.
Olesen fared even better at the Nedbank where he was third and that followed top tens in Qatar and Spain. They are both well capable of giving McIlroy and Fleetwood a run for their money.
Ryan Fox tailed off a bit at the end of the year but would be a bet if anywhere near the form that brought him Wentworth glory at the BMW PGA and second place at the Dunhill Links while two tidy players at bigger odds are former Walker Cup star Nathan Kimsey and classy Scot Conor Syme who have the right type of game for Dubai Creek.
Kimsey did well in both tours, beaten by Norrman in a playoff for the Barbasol Championship in July and third in the Spanish Open in October. There is money to be made with this 30-year-old from Lincolnshire if not this week then in lesser company later on.
Now here’s a surprise … yes, it will be sunny and warm (25C) at the weekend but there may be a cloud or two in the sky for the first two rounds. And if you’re such a big Rory fan you feel you must support him, why not ask a Fitzdares trader for a price on the Dubai Double? He’ll be more like 5/1 than 5/2 in stiffer company next week, so the double should pay around 20/1.
Best bets
1pt each-way Chris Kirk @ 25/1
1pt each-way Justin Rose @ 40/1
1pt each-way Byong-Hun An @ 28/1
1pt each-way Matt Kuchar @ 40/1
1pt each-way Harris English @ 33/1
We stay in Hawaii for week two of the PGA Tour’s Opening Swing but move islands from Maui to the capital Honolulu on Oahu’s south shore for the Sony Open at Waialae, a course that could scarcely be more different from last week’s toothless Kapalua which the professionals predictably reduced to a pitch and putt contest.
One player, Sungjae Im, fired in a record-busting 34 birdies over the 72 holes – not far short of 50% – yet didn’t win, the robotically accurate Chris Kirk who had only one bogey all week springing a monster surprise with a 29-under-par score that was one too good for Sahith Theegala and two better than our 25/1 selection Jordan Spieth.
Two other fancies Collin Morikawa and Scottie Scheffler were right behind so it was close but no cigar with honours even going into the Sony, just a 7044-yard par 70 tiddler to Kapalua’s 7586-yard par 73, flat where Kapalua was wildly undulating and fast rolling, tree-lined and tightish where Kapalua was wider than an aircraft hangar – yet similar in that the key clubs in the bag are usually wedge and putter.
With the biggest cats away, there’s every chance of a European victory as the betting suggests as they have the three co-favourites. Matt Fitzpatrick and Tyrrell Hatton shared 14th place at Kapalua with Hatton shooting 62 on Friday, a score beaten only by another Englishman, Justin Rose, on Sunday, and Ludvig Aberg is certain to improve on a disappointing first effort, his Saturday 77 proving that even standout prodigies have the odd bad day at the office.
Rose, who knows Waialae well having been runner-up to runaway winner Justin Thomas in 2017, could prove best value of the European contingent. It took him time to get over the shock of playing the wrong ball and incurring a penalty early in the week at Kapalua and that 12-birdie 61 on Sunday sent him off blooming to Honolulu.
Short-to-medium drivers and/or deadeye putters typically do well at Waialae with names like Jim Furyk, Russell Henley, Brad Faxon, Jerry Kelly and Zach Johnson prominent on the honours board which goes back to 1965 so punters cannot complain of lack of course form.
Before he wiped the floor with a superior field at The Sentry, I already had Kirk lined up for this week as he has excellent Waialae credentials, twice runner-up and third last year to Si Woo Kim. The two who have done the same-year Hawaiian double, Ernie Els in 2003 and Thomas in 2017 – he was 49 under for those magical eight rounds, then went on to win the PGA Championship in an amazing five-win year – were/are more gifted than Kirk but don’t rule out this reformed, steady-as-you-go one-time alcoholic as he makes the game look ridiculously easy when he’s in the zone.
The victory has damaged his price but I’ll still have him on my team of steady-Eddies which includes the revitalised pair Matt Kuchar and Harris English.
Kooch was champion in 2019, third in 2015 and top-ten placed on several other occasions. He looked like yesterday’s man for much of the last two campaigns but has put in the hours for one last hurrah in his mid-40s and almost won the World Wide Tech event at the end of last year.
English, third at Wells Fargo and eighth at the US Open, is now back to where he was before injury and showed his game was still buzzing with 14th at Kapalua. Third and fourth in past Sonys, he’s a fine putter with just the game for Waialae.
In a really open contest there are plenty with chances but 2022 winner Hideki Matsuyama looked well short of his best last week and is best avoided as is Will Zalatoris who missed most of last year with a serious back issue and was stone-cold last in the Hero World Challenge, 31 behind winner Scheffler. He clearly needs more time.
Si Woo Kim has his game in good shape based on last week but defending a title is added pressure so preference is for Ben An (4th), Rookie of the Year Eric Cole (T14) and flat-stick wizard JT Poston (T5) who all played more than well enough at The Sentry to fancy their chances on more conventional terrain this week.
Showing far more resolution on the greens now, An, who looked a potential world-beater when he routed a hot field for the BMW PGA at Wentworth as a virtual unknown eight years ago, could finally end his long wait for a PGA Tour victory this year. He has the game for it and maybe the self-belief is coming too.
It’s going to be dry and pleasantly warm but windy at times. Can we do a swap?!
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