Best bets
2pts each-way Hideki Matsuyama @ 8/1
1.5pts each-way Tom Kim @ 14/1
1.5pts each-way Russell Henley @ 16/1
1pt each-way Chris Kirk @ 66/1
1pt each-way Keegan Bradley @ 22/1
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While a ridiculously talented teenage darter called Luke brought the new year in for British sports fans with a bang, a cool hand and an avalanche of 180s, over in Hawaii it was all about Japanese superstar Hideki Matsuyama shooting the lights out in record-breaking, Littleresque style at Kapalua – but can he complete a sizzling Sentry-Sony Open Hawaiian double this week?
He will never have a better chance, as acknowledged by Fitzdares putting him up as 8/1 favourite in a full-field line-up of 144 where he is the only top-ten golfer teeing it up for an $8.7m pot. I was going to put him up before his stunning 35-under-par Sentry romp which has wrecked the price but it is still just about acceptable.
Sunday’s 11th career victory by the 2021 Masters champion lifted him to fifth in the world rankings and if his newly-minted centre-shafted putter again works the magic it wove on the Kapalua greens – he single-putted 35 times, holing close to 400ft of putts on the flat stick’s debut – replicating the same-year Hawaiian double that Ernie Els achieved in 2003 and Justin Thomas in 2017 is definitely on the cards.
Coming from a guy who finished down in 121st on some of last year’s putting stats, it was a revelation. And he’s won the Sony before, edging out Russell Henley, one of his chief rivals this week, in a 2022 playoff. Equally spectacular then, Hideki caught a faltering Henley from a five-behind-with-nine-to-play scenario to finish the job off with a fabulous eagle at the first extra hole.
It’s just a short hop between islands for Matsuyama from Maui to Oahu and the state capital of Honolulu for a completely different chalk-and-cheese assignation at Waialae, a short (7044-yard par 70), flat, tightish urban course demanding precision and intelligent club selection whereas undulating Kapalua is long, wide, exposed but flattering and one of the few par 73s the players see these days.
Henley is a bit of a course specialist, not only runner-up three years ago but champion at Waialae in 2013, the first victory of his career. And the 35-year-old was only one agonising shot out of last year’s three-man playoff which saw the ill-fated Grayson Murray edge out Ben An and Keegan Bradley. Less than six months later the troubled Murray took his own life.
With a swing that wouldn’t win any beauty contests, Henley isn’t one of my favourites as he tends to panic under pressure but there’s no arguing with his high finishes at the Tour Championship and The Open.
Don’t be put off by his mid-division showing at Kapalua – that’s not his track but acted as the perfect warm-up for one of his favourite weeks on the calendar. Besides, the record book shows that the majority of Waialae winners played Kapalua the week before rather than stayed home to extend their holiday.
One who didn’t play last week was the effervescent Tom Kim who missed the cut on his lone Sony visit two years ago. So that’s two negatives, yet I liked what I saw from the South Korean in pre-Christmas action – runner-up to compatriot An on home ground in the Genesis, to his great pal Scottie Scheffler in the Bahamas and again second, with the delightful Jeeno Thitikul, in the mixed pairs event in Florida.
TK, still only 22, gave himself a good talking-to after failing to live up to the electric start he made to his career and looks a man on a mission after losing 20lb, cutting out the junk food, replacing puppy fat with muscle in the gym and starting knocking the ball 15 yards further. The course with its accent on straight-shooting and great wedge play should suit.
We know it suits Chris Kirk on his second to Kevin Na in 2021 and third to Si Woo Kim two years ago and I am not put off for by a tepid defence (T44) of his Sentry crown last week. With his controlled, metronomic draw, this underrated operator with a silky putting touch looks decent each-way value at 66/1.
Corey Conners, T5 on Sunday, Sahith Theegala, Maverick McNealy and the impressive An all have claims but the final vote goes to Bradley, like An pipped in a playoff here last year and noted putting in a good shift at Kapalua (T15).
Winner of the BMW in August, then fifth at the Hero, captain Bradley seems hell-bent on playing himself into his own Ryder Cup team.
It’s going to be warm but windy leading up to a sunny weekend. Sadly not the weather forecast over here for us shivering Brits!
Best bets
5pts GB & Ireland to win @ 4/7
1pt Aaron Rai top GB & Ireland @ 7/1
1pt Rasmus Hojgaard top European @ 11/2
1pt each-way Rai top combined @ 12/1
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In Ryder Cup year what could be a more fitting start for the DP World Tour than a team competition where potential candidates for Luke Donald’s September squad can show what they’re made of?
The Hero Cup, which the Continental Europeans hold after pulling off a bit of upset in Abu Dhabi two years ago, is now simply the Team Cup, having lost its sponsor, but the format is the same: running from Friday to Sunday, one session of fourballs on day 1, two of foursomes on day 2, ten singles on day three, and 25 points at stake.
The match certainly served its purpose two years ago as six of the contestants went on to play in the real thing in Rome where captain Donald’s carefully-laid plans worked out to the tune of a wide-margin 16.5-11.5 demolition job on an American side that never turned up or knew what hit them.
If lightning strikes twice and Donald can inspire his boys in the white-hot cauldron of Bethpage Black in New York at the end of September, a knighthood surely awaits. But the bookies think it unlikely, Fitzdares going 7/10 USA and 8/5 Europe. The good news: If it’s a 14-14 dead-heat (a 12/1 chance), the Europeans, as holders, bring the trophy back with them.
If it’s down to captaincy, Cool Hand Luke left no stone unturned last time and he’s started where he left off by picking both of this week’s teams in consultation with the captains Francesco Molinari and Justin Rose and will no doubt be briefing them on what pairings he’d like to see tried out in fourballs and foursomes.
All ten players on each team have to play all four matches and that includes the captains. If you went by combined world rankings it would be no contest as Rose at 47 is over 400 spots ahead of the faded Molinari, once world No. 5, now 465.
But even taking away the two captains, GB & Ireland still come out clear. They have four of the world’s top 50 (Tommy Fleetwood 9, Tyrrell Hatton 15, Aaron Rai 21, Rose 47), the Continentals only two (Matthieu Pavon 31, Rasmus Hojgaard 37). And Hatton would rank far higher than 15th if his LIV record was allowed to count.
If Molinari’s men triumph again, half the credit will go to Denmark who provide half their squad, the two Hojgaards, Niklas Norgaard, Thorbjorn Olesen and promising rookie Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen.
Nic Hojgaard and Norgaard, the two longest hitters on either side, could turn out to be a match-winning combo on a course where power men have an edge but returning to the venue where he won the final edition of the Abu Dhabi Championship in 2021 (before the tournament moved to Yas Island) will suit Hatton down to the ground, Fleetwood even more so as he’s won there twice.
Those two and Rai, who broke through in the USA at the Wyndham Championship in August and has had the benefit of playing at Kapalua last week, playing nicely too for a top-15, hold the key to this match. Expect Fleetwood and Hatton to be split so they can nursemaid some of the new boys, just as Rose did with Bob MacIntrye in Rome.
I called it for GB & I last time and got it embarrassingly wrong – the Continentals took charge early on and kept their hands round British throats to the end for an emphatic 14.5-10.5 triumph – but I’ll fall for them again in what looks a tight contest, the Brits having the edge at the top but Continentals with maybe greater strength in depth.
Rai, the improver from Wolverhampton, fit and in form, could be top GB and match scorer if Hatton is rusty and still thinking it’s Christmas. Rasmus Hojgaard, the less flashy but more reliable of the Danish twins, and the vastly experienced Thorborn Olesen could star for the Continentals.
It would have been more fun with McIlroy, MacIntyre and Lowry in the GB & I team and Rahm, Aberg, Straka and Detry in Europe’s but it is what it is, a chance for the lesser lights to throw their hats into the Ryder Cup ring. GB & I to win 13-12.
Teams
Continental Europe: F Molinari (captain), N Hojgaard, R Hojgaard, R Neergaard-Petersen, M Manassero, N Norgaard, T Olesen, M Pavon, A Rozner, R Langasque.
Great Britain & Ireland: J Rose (captain), T Fleetwood, T Hatton, A Rai, M Wallace, T McKibbin, J Smith, L Canter, P Waring, M Jordan
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