Preview: Oman Open
The European Tour heads to Oman and Al Mouj Golf Club this week, as the European golf schedule returns to a semblance of normalcy.
The last two weeks included an off-week and a World Golf Championship, meaning a majority the core membership of the Tour haven't seen competitive play since Saudi Arabia at the beginning of February.
It's an important stretch on the European Tour for a majority of the players, and also a series of events that allows ardent golf fans to earn their stripes too. The Oman Open, Qatar Masters, Magical Kenya Open and the Hero Indian Open are the next four tournaments on Tour, and it's hardly exaggeration to presuppose that solely the most avid (or perhaps the most manic) of golf fans will tune in to follow the action.
To me, this stretch is a right of passage, akin to the coin tossed to a troll guarding a bridge.
Immediately following this four competition stretch will be the invariably entertaining WGC Match Play at Austin CC in Texas, and after that, it's The Masters.
Waking up at ungodly hours to watch European Tour stalwarts, rookies and hopefuls alike seeking a career altering victory, is not how many people will spend their time over the next four Thursday to Sunday morning's, though for golf lunatics like you and I, it may just be the description of the perfect viewing experience.
If nothing else, watching the Oman Open et al. is a way to feel like you've earned your viewing privileges for golf's two biggest events, and a way to impress you friends with obscure knowledge on Shaun Norris if he makes it to the semi-final in Austin, and Thomas Detry if he surges to a Thursday 67 at Augusta.
For the non-golf-psycho among us, this event is really like an opposite field event in a week that there is no main event; The Barbasol Championship, with no coinciding Open Championship, if you will.
In fact, it will be a week unlike the last two in golf, as many of the top players in the games are taking the week off. The Honda Classic on the PGA Tour has more big names missing on it than the POC Oscar winners Wikipedia page, and unlike three weeks ago in Saudi Arabia, these big names haven't made the subsequent journey to the Middle East.
The two renditions of this event on the European Tour have been entertaining viewing, and even with no players in the World's Top-50 present, viewers can anticipate more of the same this year.
Al Mouj GC has some supremely exciting golf holes, particularly the 465-yard Par-4 18th hole, where the players will face a tee shot over the Indian Ocean. Last year, Kurt Kitayama picked up his first of two European Tour wins during his rookie season, and in 2018 Joost Luiten picked up the sixth trophy of his European Tour career.
Tour winners like Chris Wood, Jorge Campillo and Fabrizio Zanotti have all finished as runners up at this event, too, so while the field isn't as strong as golf fans will have tuned in to see over the last couple weeks, the course produces some incredibly interesting storylines, and so far, some really fascinating names at the top end of the leaderboard.
In terms of trying to foresee the future, there doesn't seem to be any single predictor of a champion at Al Mouj. The stats in Kitayama's and Luiten's victories are about as comparable as still pictures of Patrick Reed's golf ball in the rough before and after he arrived. See below what I mean:
It's tough to draw conclusions from that!
The one stat that both winners performed well in (though this is true of most victorious weeks) was Strokes Gained: Putting. Kitayama placed second in the field with +2.53 Strokes Gained per round on the greens on the field, and Luiten placed fifth in the field with +1.74 Strokes Gained per round.
Clement Sordet has perhaps the best record of anyone at Al Mouj, winning a Challenge Tour Grand Final here in 2017. He followed that result up with a T37 in 2018 that included three rounds under par at the European Tour's first venture to Oman, and last year, the Frenchman finished T2, just a stroke behind Kitayama.
Sordet has never finished a season on the European Tour averaging less than 300 yards off the tee, and gained 0.79 strokes on the field per round in 2018 Off the Tee, and 1.36 strokes per round in 2019. This is at least a minor indication that length off the tee proves beneficial.
The headline acts this week will be Martin Kaymer, Joost Luiten, The Beglian Thomas' (Pieters and Detry), and Adri Arnaus. All of these aformentioned players will all find themselves on various betting slips this week, and for good reason.
I'm ruling out most players that played in Mexico last week, for the reason exemplified in this tweet from Pablo Larrazabal, which removes Zander Lombard, Justin Harding, Shaun Norris, Benjamin Hebert and the aforementioned Spaniard from the discussion.
It should be a fun week in Oman, and I'm expecting to see a healthy mixture of recognizable, former European Tour champions, alongside rookie's and first-win-seeker's alike. Who is going to take the Oman Open title in 2020?
Green sits Top-30 in the category of Strokes Gained: Off the Tee, as well as 11th in Strokes Gained: Putting in 2020. These are both useful utensils.
In addition to this, Malaysia's top ranked golfer is in some excellent form. His last event was in Saudi Arabia, where he finished T-3, only behind Dustin Johnson and champion Graham McDowell. In addition to this, Green not only hasn't missed a cut so far in 2020, but has finished inside the Top-30 every time he has tee'd it up in the new decade.
While his two appearances at Al Mouj (MC, 68th) doesn't inspire too much confidence, Gavin Green won't stay winless for much more of his European Tour career, and Oman might just be place be the event where he breaks the duck.
Like fellow Frenchman Clement Sordet, Julien Guerrier is somebody that has a good record at Al Mouj GC.
Guerrier finished T-3 here in 2018, carding all four rounds below par. He also has the added advantage of having seen this course more than a majority of the rest of the field, having played here twice on the Challenge Tour. During these two events, Guerrier recorded finishes of T-20 (3 under par) and T-3 (18 under par) at the Challenge Tour Grand Finals of 2017 and 2016 respectively.
It might be stretching it a little to suggest that Guerrier is capable of winning on the European Tour, as he hasn't been in breathtaking form, but a strong finish is certainly on the table. With odds of 100/1, an Each-Way bet might be worth some consideration.
So after explicitly saying nobody that had to travel 30 hours to play here could win this week, and that form was going to be a useful predictor of play in Oman, why am I taking Jorge Campillo as one of my three picks? This is my blog, and I can do what I want - that's why.
It was a T2 finish at this event last season that Campillo began an outstanding run that propelled him to a career high 59th in the Official World Golf Rankings, and a Top-20 end of season finish in the Race to Dubai.
He has two Top-5 finishes in two attempts at Al Mouj GC, and with the quality of golf that he is capable of, it's only a matter of time until Campillo hits another good spell. I expect this to be the week that Jorge comes good.
The last two weeks included an off-week and a World Golf Championship, meaning a majority the core membership of the Tour haven't seen competitive play since Saudi Arabia at the beginning of February.
Photo from The European Tour Twitter Account
This week starts a stretch that will be of paramount importance to many of the lower status players, many of whom will be looking to take a big stride over the coming weeks towards securing their cards for next season.It's an important stretch on the European Tour for a majority of the players, and also a series of events that allows ardent golf fans to earn their stripes too. The Oman Open, Qatar Masters, Magical Kenya Open and the Hero Indian Open are the next four tournaments on Tour, and it's hardly exaggeration to presuppose that solely the most avid (or perhaps the most manic) of golf fans will tune in to follow the action.
To me, this stretch is a right of passage, akin to the coin tossed to a troll guarding a bridge.
Immediately following this four competition stretch will be the invariably entertaining WGC Match Play at Austin CC in Texas, and after that, it's The Masters.
Waking up at ungodly hours to watch European Tour stalwarts, rookies and hopefuls alike seeking a career altering victory, is not how many people will spend their time over the next four Thursday to Sunday morning's, though for golf lunatics like you and I, it may just be the description of the perfect viewing experience.
If nothing else, watching the Oman Open et al. is a way to feel like you've earned your viewing privileges for golf's two biggest events, and a way to impress you friends with obscure knowledge on Shaun Norris if he makes it to the semi-final in Austin, and Thomas Detry if he surges to a Thursday 67 at Augusta.
For the non-golf-psycho among us, this event is really like an opposite field event in a week that there is no main event; The Barbasol Championship, with no coinciding Open Championship, if you will.
In fact, it will be a week unlike the last two in golf, as many of the top players in the games are taking the week off. The Honda Classic on the PGA Tour has more big names missing on it than the POC Oscar winners Wikipedia page, and unlike three weeks ago in Saudi Arabia, these big names haven't made the subsequent journey to the Middle East.
The two renditions of this event on the European Tour have been entertaining viewing, and even with no players in the World's Top-50 present, viewers can anticipate more of the same this year.
Al Mouj GC has some supremely exciting golf holes, particularly the 465-yard Par-4 18th hole, where the players will face a tee shot over the Indian Ocean. Last year, Kurt Kitayama picked up his first of two European Tour wins during his rookie season, and in 2018 Joost Luiten picked up the sixth trophy of his European Tour career.
Tour winners like Chris Wood, Jorge Campillo and Fabrizio Zanotti have all finished as runners up at this event, too, so while the field isn't as strong as golf fans will have tuned in to see over the last couple weeks, the course produces some incredibly interesting storylines, and so far, some really fascinating names at the top end of the leaderboard.
In terms of trying to foresee the future, there doesn't seem to be any single predictor of a champion at Al Mouj. The stats in Kitayama's and Luiten's victories are about as comparable as still pictures of Patrick Reed's golf ball in the rough before and after he arrived. See below what I mean:
- Kitayama led the field in driving distance last year at 328.25 (!!) yards en route to the title, whereas Luiten was 53rd in the field in 2018 at 296.50 yards.
- Luiten hit over 80% of fairways in 2018, whereas Kitayama hit less than 60%.
- Luiten was Top-10 in Strokes Gained: Tee to Green, while Kitayama was 40th the year he won.
- Neither Luiten nor Kitayama were inside the Top-15 in Scrambling the week they won.
It's tough to draw conclusions from that!
The one stat that both winners performed well in (though this is true of most victorious weeks) was Strokes Gained: Putting. Kitayama placed second in the field with +2.53 Strokes Gained per round on the greens on the field, and Luiten placed fifth in the field with +1.74 Strokes Gained per round.
Clement Sordet has perhaps the best record of anyone at Al Mouj, winning a Challenge Tour Grand Final here in 2017. He followed that result up with a T37 in 2018 that included three rounds under par at the European Tour's first venture to Oman, and last year, the Frenchman finished T2, just a stroke behind Kitayama.
Sordet has never finished a season on the European Tour averaging less than 300 yards off the tee, and gained 0.79 strokes on the field per round in 2018 Off the Tee, and 1.36 strokes per round in 2019. This is at least a minor indication that length off the tee proves beneficial.
The headline acts this week will be Martin Kaymer, Joost Luiten, The Beglian Thomas' (Pieters and Detry), and Adri Arnaus. All of these aformentioned players will all find themselves on various betting slips this week, and for good reason.
I'm ruling out most players that played in Mexico last week, for the reason exemplified in this tweet from Pablo Larrazabal, which removes Zander Lombard, Justin Harding, Shaun Norris, Benjamin Hebert and the aforementioned Spaniard from the discussion.
It should be a fun week in Oman, and I'm expecting to see a healthy mixture of recognizable, former European Tour champions, alongside rookie's and first-win-seeker's alike. Who is going to take the Oman Open title in 2020?
Gavin Green
Photo by The European Tour
It almost seems made up that Gavin Green hasn't won yet. It also seems made up that he isn't sponsored by a prominent waterproof manufacturer, but that's a discussion for a different time.Green sits Top-30 in the category of Strokes Gained: Off the Tee, as well as 11th in Strokes Gained: Putting in 2020. These are both useful utensils.
In addition to this, Malaysia's top ranked golfer is in some excellent form. His last event was in Saudi Arabia, where he finished T-3, only behind Dustin Johnson and champion Graham McDowell. In addition to this, Green not only hasn't missed a cut so far in 2020, but has finished inside the Top-30 every time he has tee'd it up in the new decade.
While his two appearances at Al Mouj (MC, 68th) doesn't inspire too much confidence, Gavin Green won't stay winless for much more of his European Tour career, and Oman might just be place be the event where he breaks the duck.
Julien Geurrier
Guerrier finished T-3 here in 2018, carding all four rounds below par. He also has the added advantage of having seen this course more than a majority of the rest of the field, having played here twice on the Challenge Tour. During these two events, Guerrier recorded finishes of T-20 (3 under par) and T-3 (18 under par) at the Challenge Tour Grand Finals of 2017 and 2016 respectively.
It might be stretching it a little to suggest that Guerrier is capable of winning on the European Tour, as he hasn't been in breathtaking form, but a strong finish is certainly on the table. With odds of 100/1, an Each-Way bet might be worth some consideration.
Jorge Campillo
Photo by The European Tour
Don't go anywhere! Sure, his form is horrible - really, incredibly horrible. I also know that I just ruled out players that played the WGC-Mexico last week.So after explicitly saying nobody that had to travel 30 hours to play here could win this week, and that form was going to be a useful predictor of play in Oman, why am I taking Jorge Campillo as one of my three picks? This is my blog, and I can do what I want - that's why.
It was a T2 finish at this event last season that Campillo began an outstanding run that propelled him to a career high 59th in the Official World Golf Rankings, and a Top-20 end of season finish in the Race to Dubai.
He has two Top-5 finishes in two attempts at Al Mouj GC, and with the quality of golf that he is capable of, it's only a matter of time until Campillo hits another good spell. I expect this to be the week that Jorge comes good.
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