The Punter / Steven Rawlings / 10 November 2008 / Leave a Comment

Burning the candle at both ends to keep up with events, it's been a punishing weekend on planet Punter with our man befuddled by production gremlins and exasperated by broadcaster's whims. However, the Children's Classic was a classic with Disney proving that dreams really can come true.

A topsy-turvy weekend, with play at the Children's Classic preceding the action at the HSBC in China.

At the Disney event on Saturday night all my bullets went astray apart from Troy Matteson who bumbled along just about keeping on the coat-tails of the leaders.
At the halfway stage of the round Scot Verplank went three shots clear and traded at odds on. Too short I felt, given his record in contention, and I layed him at [1.73]. By the end of the day he'd been collared by Steve Marino and I knew I had something to play with. I parked it and went to bed with the alarm set for 4.00am.

When I woke, I made tea and decided, before logging on to see the scores, to watch Sky Sports catch up on the earlier action at the start of their programme. But there were production gremlins and it was all a bit odd. They didn't show a leaderboard but you could hear Ewan Murray saying Phil Mickelson, my in-running pick at [5.4], was level with Garcia in the lead, so I was happy enough.

But then they showed him in the water. I saw he was only on the sixth hole and was confused. I logged on and the scoreboard was stuck further back than that. I was even more confused. Then I noticed there was no LIVE logo in the corner of the screen. Once I found an alternative updated scoreboard, Mickelson had actually played 14 holes and was one off the lead. I exhaled, drank my tea and went back to bed. I'm not going to start watching recorded golf in the middle of the night.

Back up at 8.00am, roughly the time I expected the last round to begin; great guess as the leaders were walking up the first fairway. I'd lost hardly any sleep and was going to see the first three or four holes live at least.

Or was I? No, Sky ended their programme at the scheduled time of 8.30am with at least half-an-hour's play left. The only upside was that in all the confusion I managed to add to my bets with Geoff Ogilvy at [7.0] when he should have been no bigger than [4.5].
At the close of play, with the leaders still on the third hole of the final round, Oliver Wilson led by one from Ogilvy and by two from Mickelson and Garcia, with play due to resume at 11.30pm UK time.

At 4.00pm yesterday afternoon the leaders teed off at the Children's Classic and what a classic it was. I haven't enjoyed an event so much in ages. Trading wise, here's a brief synopsis; Verplank was hopeless, Davis Love III started well and I layed him too at [2.4], after just four holes. Then half-an-hour later I also layed Steve Marino, at [3.5]. So I had a decent little book, with all earlier wasted wagers covered and with hope that there could be a miraculous and tasty result. And there very nearly was.

Tommy 'Two Gloves' Gainey looked like he was going to script his own fairytale and prove that at Disney, dreams really do come true. I confess I knew nothing of him. He was [1000.0] before the off, has just about the worst and fastest swing I've ever seen and is a former star of a golf reality show called Big Break which I've never watched. It took until the 13th hole before I was convinced enough by what Id seen of him to take a small interest at [11.0].

Remarkably, he shot 30 on the back nine, birdying the last two holes and showed an incredible degree of bottle making no mistakes and finishing four clear of the field bar one. That one was Davis Love III, who matched the eight under final round of Tommy 'Two Gloves' courtesy of some peerless putting. Birdies form 25 feet on the 14th and 17 feet on the 16th, together with two great par saves and a smidgen of luck on the last two holes ended the dream for Gainey.

I had layed back some of my Gainey bet at [3.1] so in the end it was a marginally profitable event but it was an extremely enjoyable one. Credit to Love, who at 44 was winning his 20th career PGA TOUR victory, giving him a lifetime exemption; a great story in itself.

Groggy and tired I watched Lefty and Ogilvy start well in China and for five minutes it looked as though the tournament would concern my pair but it's never that easy with Mickelson. Just as he traded below [2.5] and was starting to look majestic he drove out of bounds on the seventh. He was all over the place after that and when he three putted the 14th and wildly drove into trees on the 15th it was time for bed.

If I wasn't going to sit up through the night to watch recorded golf, I certainly didn't want to watch pound notes burn. But with all that caffeine and sugar still coursing my veins, sleep I couldn't. So I got up again and went back to the goggle box to see two players in Oliver Wilson and Sergio Garcia, both of whom I wouldn't judge to be the most resolute, do nothing wrong at all as they bravely went putt for putt and headlong into a play off.

I can't defend Mickelson anymore, he's been a cash cow for three or more years for me but the last six months have been tale of woe after tale of woe and as for Sergio... Maybe he finally is the real deal.

Whether he has matured enough to be the multiple Major winner he's always promised to be remains to be seen but after edging out Wilson on the second play-off hole he is now not only the HSBC Champion but the number two in the world and starting to walk the walk.

No USPGA event until January now, but there's a cracker coming up - the Singapore Open, where Phil Mickelson heads a star-studded line up As usual I'll preview the event on Wednesday.

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