Golf Events / Tareq Quiroz / 10 December 2008 / Leave a comment

The world's top golfers will jostle for positions in South Africa this weekend but Lee Westwood and co should be warned that the Gary Player designed course is no birdie blitz, says Tareq Quiroz.

What joy it is to be a golf fanatic. No matter what time of year, no matter how cold it is outside your own front door you just know that somewhere we can have a top class golf event.

We were treated to watching a masterclass of golf last week as Henrik Stenson simply blew the field away in the Nedbank Challenge in Sun City. The Super Swede racked up his second consecutive win and this week's participants in the Alfred Dunhill Championships will be delighted he has decided to skip the event.

The Course

Leopard Creek GC is yet another awesome South African course. It is located in Mpumalanga, which is just a stone's throw from the Kruger National Park. It is a Gary Player designed track that was opened in 1996 and is a great venue for one of South Africa's main events. The course measures 7,249 yards and is a fair test of the world's top golfers. It is by no means a birdie blitz course and you may well find only two or three players past the 10 under par mark at the end of the tournament. With three par fives in the final six holes you should expect plenty of leaderboard movement towards the end of the tournament.

The Favourite

The deserved jolly this week is Lee Westwood. Unbelievably, he is still looking for his first win this year. It seems that in virtually every event he contests he is up near the top of the leaderboard but he has yet to get over the winning line. As one of the most prolific winners on the European Tour ever you cannot question his ability. After having his tonsils removed a few weeks ago Westwood was back in action last week at Sun City. He never really got into contention there, but then again that tournament was all over bar the shouting pretty early on. He did strike the ball well though and in what is a predominantly weak field he has to be the man to beat. I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from backing him at current odds of [7.2].

The Next Best Bets

The top quality batch of South African's have a terrific record in tournaments in their own country. There is no Els, Goosen or Immelman this week but there are many other top class South Africans taking part. The best of them at the moment is Charl Schwartzel. His chances are obvious as he is a previous winner on this course and has had a very good season. It seems as though Charl has taken his game to another level and back on this course he has to be in with a great chance. He is certainly my idea of the value bet this week and is my main fancy at odds of around [10.5].

The Massive Outsider

There are a few down the field who catch my eye this week. Many of them are European Tour also rans who are looking to get some money in the bag before 2009. It is not easy to pick out players who have been in any sort of form but one guy who fits bill is Oskar Henningsson. He was pretty impressive in winning the Tour Qualifying School recently. That is a horrible event to have to play in and he will come here with some confidence. Henningsson may well turn out to be a useful player so it can't hurt to get a saver on him this week at odds of around [280.0].

Interesting Info

In 2003 this event was the subject of an unbelievable six man play-off. Don't get too carried away with the early pacesetter as nobody has ever won this tournament by leading from start to finish. The tournament has a very good record for producing first time winners with eight of the fourteen winners being first timers.