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SAA Open Betting: Is this the end of the Els-Goosen golden era?

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Paul Krishnamurty wonders whether South Africa's two leading players are on the way down...

Generally speaking, South African golf has never been in better shape. Like most lower level regional Tours, the Sunshine Tour is struggling to consistently attract big prize money and the accompanying world stars.

But on the world stage the Rainbow Nation has never enjoyed stronger representation. Ernie Els and Retief Goosen have long been well established as the major-winning heirs to Gary Player, and in the last couple of years the likes of Trevor Immelman, Tim Clark and Rory Sabbatini have become regular contenders at the very highest level. Slightly lower down the pecking order, Charl Schwartzel, Richard Sterne and Louis Oosthuisen are widely seen as emerging stars.

Over the last few months though, doubts have been raised as to whether the country's two talismen, Els and Goosen, will ever return to their major winning best. In fact, as almost all the leading South Africans descend on the Cape for their national Open, the question punters are asking is whether either of them still deserve their customary status at or near the head of the betting.

To be honest, I'm still in a state of shock from Ernie's dreadful final hole collapse on Sunday. The fact it cost me a few quid is irrelevant, I just found it terribly sad to see Ernie make such a laughing stock of himself. That triple-bogey on the par-5 18th will go down in history as one of golf's all-time great turnarounds, arguably worse than the legendary Van De Velde disaster. At least the Frenchman had the excuse that he was playing one of the toughest holes in world golf, aiming to transform his career by winning the Open. It was certainly one of the most dramatic golfing moments in Betfair history, one that I'm sure none of the 1.01 layers will ever forget.

Its probably important not to over-react though. That wasn't by any means the first time that Ernie, golf's perennial runner-up, has screwed up at the death. Steve Elkington and lesser lights such as Lian-Wei Zhang, Robert-Jan Derksen and Jarrod Moseley have all humbled the Big Easy on similar previous occasions when it seemed impossible to lose. This is quite clearly a temperament issue.

As I've argued before, it's not that he's a bottler - no bottler could win three majors and seven World Matchplay titles. In head-to-head scenarios, there remain very few players about whom I'd be more confident. Rather it seems that Els has a tendency to lose focus when clear out in front. It's certainly a frustrating characteristic, but by no means evidence of a terminal decline.

Lets not forget that for the previous 71 holes at Leopard Creek he had looked in a different class to the field and by far the likeliest winner. It's also only six weeks since he won the World Matchplay and three months since he was placed in consecutive major championships. I'm sure Ernie's pride has been dented a lot more than his confidence, and expect him to put in a determined effort to immediately set the record straight. Plenty of punters will no doubt look to lay him this week at short-odds across all the usual win and place markets, but I will not be among them.

Goosen's woes seem more serious though, with drastic improvement required if he wants to add to an impressive South African Open record. There's been few more lucrative strategies in recent months than laying the Goose. As I wrote back in September, Goosen's enduring reputation as a dual major winner means that despite his troubles being well documented, his odds for the top-five and top-10 markets remain consistently short. In the three months since, his woes have continued and incredibly you have to go back to April for the last time Goosen made the top-10. At his most recent event at Sun City, he finished last of 12, seven shots behind the next man. Given that record, at odds of around [3.1] for a top-10 finish I'd much rather be a layer.

Neither player should be written off just yet. Both are young enough and good enough to win Majors again if they can return to their best form. But for what is certainly the first time in living memory, I don't think either man deserves to be favourite for their national Open. For me, that accolade goes to Trevor Immelman, who was mightily impressive a fortnight ago when winning the Nedbank Challenge with Els and Goosen five and 26 shots behind respectively. Immelman has known Els since childhood, and has often credited the Big Easy as a huge influence on his career. We may be about to see one of those instances where the pupil overtakes his teacher.