US Masters / Bill Elliott / 31 March 2010 /

Casey's Masters record is quietly impressive and the mercurial man may just be the best bet from a clutch of class Englishman for 2010's first major

Paul Casey is a lot of things...occasionally cocky verging on arrogant, eternally opinionated and occasionally hectically in your face may be a few of these things but there are others more relevant here and these include prodigiously talented and seriously mercurial.

Steamed down, these latter virtues suggest that the short, stocky and muscled Englishman may be one of those players too unpredictable to follow in the betting markets but the big fact here is that Casey, viewed how you like, surely must be a contender at Augusta.

Consider this for example: since making his debut in the 2004 Masters, Casey has played a total of five, missed the halfway cut once and rolled along to sixth, tenth, 11th and 20th in his other campaigns. If this suggests to you that he (a) like the place and (b) has the game to prosper sensationally at a Masters then welcome to the club. The 32-year-old is [30.0] to win the first major of the year.

Until his rib injury last summer Casey was displaying a game that had moved on to a new, higher and genuinely reassuring plateau of achievement. The old days of good-poor-good again and then poor seemed behind him. Since tentatively making his way back from that bruising accident the smart money suggests that he is now closer to being better still in 2010.

This, happily, is a suspicion he shares albeit cautiously. "I'm not 100 per cent yet because it (the injury) still gets a little tired. The problem I get is still flexibility with the body, mainly the back because it tightens up to protect the ribs at the front. But I don't feel it's hindering my golf, " he says.

"I'm still slightly protective of it because in theory it's still something that I could re-injure but I am enjoying my golf and enjoying playing. So far this year it's better than I thought it would be. Being ranked as high as I am now I think my expectations are a little higher so I'm putting pressure on myself to perform.

"That's what I'm meant to do, isn't it? But then I'm a half-full guy rather than a half-empty one. Mind you, I've needed to be (optimistic) because I've had some ups and downs over the last nine years."

Luckily for Casey, the ups have tended to be big ones. His high flight and narrowly focused approach to the old game may not be to everyone's taste but his golf was honed during college in Arizona and his approach to the big challenges is rarely less than impressive.

He may be a wealthy bloke now but he knows what it is like to have not a lot. A working-class background meant he always had to battle for everything as a youngster growing up in Surrey. His initial ambition was to be a pro tennis player but when he failed to secure a tennis scholarship at Wentworth he concentrated on golf and won a scholarship at the Foxhills club just down the road.

It turned out to be the right choice and he is now obviously at the forefront of a phalanx of youngish Englishmen who continue to promise much even if the biggest deals are yet to be delivered.

"It's great to have so many Englishmen in the top 100 now. In fact it's a bit of a race now for each of us wants to be the first to win a major. It's also a nice sort of warm and cosy feeling to have that many friends of mine high up in the world rankings. But this shouldn't be confused with any kind of complacency.

"Everybody is pushing everybody else very, very hard. So when Westy is winning the Race to Dubai we all congratulate him - and mean it - but it means also that we each really want to win it this year. When Poulter wins the Match Play we all want to be the guy who is the next Englishman to win another PGA Tour event.

"So, while I don't know why so many of us are being successful at present, I do know that it's helped and that we push each other along. And apart from anything else, it's fun."

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