Golf Events / Tareq Quiroz / 21 January 2009 /

Tareq Quiroz takes a look at the odds ahead of the Qatar Masters, which tees off in Doha on Thursday and features a stellar field of world golfing talent.

Seamlessly, we are right back into the swing of tournament life. Last week we had a terrific event in Abu Dhabi that seemed destined for a runaway win for Paul Casey until he got an attack of the jitters and stumbled across the line. Something tells me that we have a very special event in store this week on the European Tour. Qatar is the venue and plenty of the world's best players have arrived for the shootout in the desert.

The Course
Doha GC is the setting for the Qatar Masters, a tournament that is now in its 12th year. It has a fine history of providing us with exciting events and great champions. Given decent conditions the course is set-up to take a very low score. Never more obvious than when Adam Scott shot an incredible 61 on his way to victory last year. The winner this week will need to be a birdie machine and the type of player who punishes easy holes. There are plenty of them on this course and pars simply will not do. In recent years it has been a big hitter's paradise and I don't expect anything different this time around.

The Favourite
The battle to head the market is once again a fierce one. It looks to be a straight fight between Sergio Garcia and two-time winner Adam Scott for that honour. That is a testament to both of their credentials when you consider that this field also contains Els, Stenson, Westwood, Goosen, Casey, Karlsson and Rose. Garcia showed last week that his game is in good order and this course really should be right up his street. Scott however has played here twice and won twice. He also played well enough in Hawaii last week but the nod has to go to Garcia. I am sure the Spaniard will have a cracking year and this will be a great start. Expect him to go low in the first round and the current odds of [11.5] will look like a great shout.

The Next Best Bets
As mentioned previously this field is packed full of amazing players. It would be hard to knock the chances of anyone who is in the top 20 in the betting. An interesting shout is US Ryder Cup star Boo Weekley. I think it is fair to say that Boo is not exactly the archetypal golfer but he certainly knows how to get the job done. For someone of his ability he certainly merits a small saver at odds of [60.0]. A slightly more confident wager must go on Martin Kaymer. He put in a sterling defence of his title last week and comes here in great form without ever really having the pressure of battling for a win. The ever maturing German represents good value at current odds of [25.0].

The Massive Outsider
It is difficult to envisage a huge outsider winning with such a quality field but that does not mean there is any lack of value flying around. Alexander Noren is a player to follow this year and with any luck we can get him over the winning line at a big price. He is a great talent who is a future Ryder Cup player in the making. Get on him this week at [130.0] as it is just too big to resist. Another player who played very well last week is Graeme Storm. He is not a player to be taken lightly as he is more than capable of challenging for a title such as this. In recent times he has shown he isn't scared of mixing it with the big boys so he is certainly worth a small investment at [170.0].

Interesting Info
In just 11 years there have been eight holes in one at this event, with an amazing three coming in the 1999 edition. In two of the last three years the winner here has been the person leading after the first round, something worth bearing in mind after round one.

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