Betfair Official Blog

US Open Betting: As Woods leaves us speechless, it may be time to turn to Ogilvy

Click here to view market

Paul Krishnamurty was up during the early hours to watch Tiger Woods play one of the most remarkable back-nines ever. He now updates us on his position in the winner market and picks out a few bets on the two-balls that may be worth looking at.

US OPEN UPDATE: Super-human Woods looms large over the outright market, so stick with the recent form players to clean up on Saturday's 2-balls.

Never has the phrase 'beware the injured golfer' been more apt. Those of us who stayed up through the early hours to see the second round through to its conclusion were treated to something very, very special from a man about whom we long ran out of appropriate superlatives.

Make no mistake, Tiger Woods is injured. Perhaps quite badly. Halfway through his second round, the limping and grimacing were so plain to see that the commentary team were doubting whether he could finish the round, let alone the tournament. At this stage, he was +2 for the day, six shots off the lead and barely hitting a fairway. Tiger's response? To play his last-nine on this very tough course in 30 shots.

I simply can't believe anyone could have formed an intelligent argument predicting this outcome. Even when he trailed by a couple of shots in his 3-ball and traded as high as [4.6], closing out my pre-round lay never even crossed my mind. Still, at least my loss was limited to the round and is more than compensated by a good long-term position on the outright market. There will be plenty of shell-shocked layers around this morning, who understandably forced his odds out to a high of [8.8]. After that point, Woods' progress was relentless and there must be many a red position about the favourite.

Now just [2.36] to win his fourteenth major, there are few pleasant options ahead for someone with that book. If it wasn't for this injury, he would surely be much shorter than that, though in fairness its not a one-man show just yet. Even assuming super-human Tiger can continue to thrive despite the injury, there are enough quality players on the leaderboard to give him a run for his money over the weekend.

Halfway leader Stuart Appleby has yet to win a Major, and has a poor history in this one, but the Aussie has proven his front-running mettle numerous times before. His compatriot Geoff Ogilvy is one of two former US Open champions within striking distance, the other being a surprisingly resurgent Ernie Els. And amongst the twelve players besides Woods currently on even par or better, there are five Europeans including Order of Merit principals Robert Karlsson, Miguel-Angel Jiminez and yesterday's advised in-running trade Lee Westwood.

Without Woods, all of these and several others would have very strong claims. And while they're all in double-figures, a trading case could be made for any of them. Personally though, I'm happy to cheer on Woods and Westwood tonight, and make the third-round 2-balls my immediate betting focus. In fact if you were looking to get against Tiger tonight because of the injury, then the [3.3] about bang-in-form Karlsson to win their 2-ball arguably carries less risk than an outright lay at 2.36.

The stand-out pairing amongst the leaders is the match between those former US Open champions. Considering Ernie's excellent form over the first two days has come somewhat out of the blue, I've got to side with Ogilvy at [2.0]. On 2008 form, particularly recent weeks, the Aussie has been clearly the better player.

Using the same logic, Oliver Wilson probably deserves to be a shorter price than [1.8] to beat fellow Brit Robert Dinwiddie. The latter has done brilliantly to get here, and has made a superb start on his US debut to stand at +2. But lets not forget his overall European form is erratic and includes as many high scores as it does low ones. Its incomparable to Wilson, who has been the most consistent player in Europe this season. Wilson has not hit worse than 74 since the first week in March, whereas half of Dinwiddie's last twelve rounds have been above that score.

And again, recent form leads me to make Soren Hansen at [1.9] to beat former Open champion Todd Hamilton the bet of the day. The Dane, a model of consistency in recent weeks, went under-par last night to make the cut from an unlikely position. For me, that measures favourably compared to the pair of 74s produced by Hamilton to make his first ever US Open cut. And remember, Hamilton has been one of the most 'gone' players in the world in the last couple of years and has yet to register a single top-20 in 2008.

ADVISED BETS

2-BALLS

18.00 SOREN HANSEN @ 1.9 (VS HAMILTON)
21.50 OLIVER WILSON @ 1.8 (VS DINWIDDIE)
22.10 GEOFF OGILVY @ 2.0 (VS ELS)