Golf Tips: Best bets for this week's Phoenix Open and Qatar Masters

• Steve Rawlings previews and provides weekend in-play blog

• Check out Steve's outsiders to back at 100/1101.00 and bigger

• Dave Tindall has e/w and first round leader tips

• Andy Swales brings course info and form players

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Phoenix Open tips and predictions

The Punter's Preview: Scheffler the straightforward selection at 5/23.50

Steve Rawlings: Accuracy from the tee has been fractionally more important than length at TPC Scottsdale but there's not much in it. The last 10 winners have had an average Driving Distance ranking of 22.5 and an average Driving Accuracy ranking of 20.9 so neither metric is crucial...

Having won the American Express comfortably two weeks ago, as well as this event twice, in 2022 and 2023, before trading at odds-on to rack up the hattrick in 2024, Scottie Scheffler is simply impossible to ignore here. Having won 14 of the last 35 PGA Tour events he's played in, Scheffler has a current strike rate of 40% suggesting he's very fair price at 5/2 at a venue he clearly loves.

Older punters will remember just how profitable Tiger Woods was to follow, winning year after year at the same venues, and Scheffler proved well worth following last year. It's not easy to convince yourself to back someone at 5/2 to win a competitive PGA Tour event but when the stats suggest they should be trading at around 6/4 it simply needs to be done.

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Each-way Tips: Back Brooks at 30/131.00

Dave Tindall: Brooks Koepka won on his course debut here in 2015 and in his last two visits he won again in 2021 and was third in 2022. Last week's 56th at Torrey Pines was just fine. He'd missed his three previous cuts there and doesn't like the greens. The encouraging aspect was that Koepka ranked 3rd Tee To Green and 20th for Approach at La Quinta. He was dead last in putting to back up the idea that he really doesn't like those surfaces...

Koepka has always putted well on the Scottsdale greens - positive SGP figures in all five visits and in four of those he ranked 18th or better (5th on most recent start there). And it's worth noting that the flatstick looked in decent order when he came over to play the DP World Tour late last year. He ranked 7th for SG: Putting when fourth at the Open de France and also had positive figures at Wentworth.

The 'X' factor in Phoenix is the crowd. It's the loudest and most attended tournament in world golf and Koepka is a player who relishes the atmosphere. For him, there's nothing worse than plodding around in silence; he needs to feel the buzz to get the competitive juices flowing.

It explains why he's been so brilliant in majors and why two of his rather paltry tally of four wins outside of the majors have come here. Koepka is 33s with eight places but his price jumps to 50/1 with five and the latter is worth the risk.

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First Round Leader Tips: 60/161.00 Fowler fancied to start fast

Dave Tindall: Rickie Fowler knows a thing or two about first-round leads having once started out with a 62 on day one of the 2023 US Open in LA. No-one in the history of the majors has ever shot a lower round.

The Californian is also a two-time FRL here, an event where he can boast a win, two seconds and a fourth in his time.

Fowler's first ever round at TPC Scottsdale was a 65 (enough for third spot after 18 holes back in 2010) so the good vibes are always there whenever he returns to the par 71.

With course form ticked, the only question is whether he's playing well enough to start fast again. The answer is yes. Fowler ended 2025 with a pair of top 10s and was fourth and seventh respectively after round one in those two events.

After a lengthy break he's started his 2026 campaign with a tied 18th in The American Express where he opened 67-63 to sit sixth at halfway.

Add in what looks a preferable afternoon tee-time (12.55pm local) and Fowler is worth a play at 60/161.00 (1/4 odds, 5 places).  

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Course and current form stats

Course Form Pick

The second favourite didn't play at the last two editions of this event but he made the top-10 on four of his last five visits, including third-place in 2022 and second the year before. He missed the cut last week but will fancy his chances of kickstarting his season in Arizona. 

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Qatar Masters tips and predictions

The Punter's Preview:  Reed very much the man to beat

Steve Rawlings: Having drifted out to 18.535/2, Patrick Reed has tightened up fractionally in the Betfair Exchange market but he's still a very fair price at around 17.016/1.

The 35-year-old American started last week's Bahrain Championship slowly, sitting tied for 58^th and six off the lead after shooting 71 on Thursday afternoon and he trailed by 10 strokes at halfway, despite shooting a five-under-par 67 on Friday morning.

Matched at as high as 100.099/1, it looked highly unlikely that the Texan would be able to go back-to-back after his impressive four-stroke victory in the Dubai Desert Classic at the Emirates the week before, but he gave it a good go.

Reed climbed up into a tie for third with a 66 on Saturday and after a 67 on Sunday, he was matched at a low of 1.728/11 before being eliminated at the first hole of the playoff when he hit the lip of a fairway bunker.

There are numerous examples of Reed holding his form for several weeks in-a-row, most notably when he won the US Masters in 2018 after a run of decent results, and he'll be very happy with the draw this week.

Reed played the first three rounds of last week's event with Martin Couvra so he'll enjoy the familiarity this week and an early start on day one may prove a plus too.

Reed, who also has a second and a third at the Earth Course, is bidding to become the sixth man to win at both Doha and the Emirates, and he has brilliant numbers in the key stat, SG: Tee-to-Green, too, having ranked 19^th, first and fourth in each of his last three events.

He's the man to beat and should be at the head of the market.

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Big Price Tips:  Prolific winner Van Tonder a huge price in Qatar

Steve Rawlings: As highlighted in the preview, South Africans have a great record at the Qatar Masters and the one I like at a big price is Daniel van Tonder, who won back-to-back on the HotelPlanner Tour this time last year.

The prolific 34-year-old, who has also won once on the DP World Tour and 12 times on the Sunshine Tour, missed the cut in his first start of the year in Bahrain last week after a 77 on Thursday left him with too much to do, but he was in fine form at the end of 2025, when he ranked fourth, ninth and 16^th SG: Tee-to-Green when finishing 10^th in the Nedbank, 14^th in the Alfred Dunhill Championship and 15^th in Mauritius.

Like Kimsey, van Tonder has only played Doha once before, finishing 47^th two years ago, but a vast bank of course experience is far from an essential prerequisite at Doha.

Last year's winner, Li, had limited Doha figures reading MC-16^th, the two winners before him had played here just once before, and the three winners before them were playing here for the first time.

Place order to lay 8 Us @ 10.09/1 and 12 Us @ 2.01/1

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Course and current form stats

Current Form Pick:

The American was tied for runner-up last week, losing in a play-off, a winner the week before, and arrives in Doha in red hot form. He has an affinity for playing golf in this part of the world and warrants joint-favouritism.

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Now read an early preview of US Masters 2026 with three bets from Dave Tindall

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