Open Championship 2026: Three picks from Dave Tindall in his early look at Royal Birkdale

• Robert MacIntyre is really making his mark in the majors now

• Russell Henley has finished 5th and 10th in the last two Opens

• Cameron Young looks to be seriously underrated

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Tournament: The 2026 Open Championship
When: July 16-19
Where: Royal Birkdale Golf Club, Southport, England
How to watch: All four days live on Sky Sports

Royal Birkdale and its dramatic dunes is one of the most popular Open courses on the rota.

The Southport venue has hosted the championship on 10 occasions, the most recent in 2017 when Jordan Spieth scored a thrilling victory over fellow American Matt Kuchar.

That year also saw Branden Grace become the first player in major history to shoot a 62.

Spieth won with 12-under in 2017 but nine years earlier, in much tougher conditions, Padraig Harrington lifted the claret jug with a winning score of 3-over.

A decade earlier in 1998, Mark O'Meara shot even par before beating compatriot Brian Watts in a playoff. Tiger Woods was a shot back as Americans filled the podium. 

Here's the top five and their stats from the 2017 event:

-12 Jordan Spieth (DD: 44, DA: 59, GIR: 3, Scr: 4, PA 10, AA: 8
-9 Matt Kuchar (DD: 55, DA: 41, GIR: 29, Scr: 18, PA 9, AA: 17
-6 Haotong Li (DD: 27, DA: 70, GIR: 47, Scr: 9, PA 4, AA: 20
-5 Rafa Cabrera-Bello (DD: 40, DA: 17, GIR: 11, Scr: 12, PA 31, AA: 5
-5 Rory McIlroy (DD: 3, DA: 41, GIR: 58, Scr: 12, PA 19, AA: 10

Notes: Driving didn't seem important while GIR had mixed numbers too. The story was short game, with many of the leading players scrambling and putting well.

It was a largely similar story in 2008, with scrambling again import. Winner Harrington was 13th in that category and 4th for Putting Average.  

To further shine a light on scrambling, the first three home in the 2025 Open Championship were Scottie Scheffler, Harris English and Chris Gotterup. They ranked 3rd, 18th and 19th for Scrambling on the PGA Tour in 2025.  

The Betfair Sportsbook is currently offering six each-way places (1/5 odds) and the top of the betting (December 18th) looks like this.

4/15.00 Scottie Scheffler, 6/17.00 Rory McIlroy, 12/113.00 Jon Rahm, Xander Schauffele, 16/117.00 Bryson DeChambeau, 18/119.00 Tommy Fleetwood, 22/123.00 Colin Morikawa, 25/126.00 Ludvig Aberg, Shane Lowry, 28/129.00 Tyrrell Hatton, Viktor Hovland, 33/134.00 Justin Thomas, Robert MacIntyre, 40/141.00 Hideki Matsuyama, Joaquin Niemann, Jordan Spieth, Matt Fitzpatrick, Patrick Cantlay. 

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Bet 1: Back Robert MacIntyre @ 33/134.00

After finishing runner-up at the US Open and tied seventh at the Open Championship - the final two majors of 2025 - Robert MacIntyre has shown he belongs at this level.

And if he does well in the first three of 2026, the Scot will come firmly into the crosshairs for Royal Birkdale and surely this 33/134.00 will be chopped.

Before that seventh place at Royal Portrush, the left-hander had shown that he had the game to be a claret jug winner.

MacIntyre was tied sixth in the 2019 edition at Portrush and also tied eighth in the 2021 Open at Royal St George's. In other words, he's finished in the top eight in half of his six Open Championships.

Back in 2019, MacIntyre headed to Portrush ranked 167th in the Datagolf World Rankings. 

As 2025 comes to a close, he's ranked 11th after those two impressive majors and an end to the year which saw him help Europe capture the Ryder Cup at Bethpage and follow that by winning the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship and adding top 10s in Abu Dhabi and the DP World Tour Championship.

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Bet 2: Back Russell Henley @ 50/151.00

There continues to be a clash between Russell Henley's Datagolf World Ranking of 6th and the perception of how good a golfer he is.

And his price reflects the lack of faith many have as he's being dangled at big odds in all the majors.

For this he's 50/151.00, but a shorter, more cerebal test might just suit the American (he'll be 37 at the 2026 Open) better than the big, long tests back home.

It's taken a while for Henley to get to grips with this tournament but there's always been a feeling that he would crack the code one day given how well he's played in other coastal events.

He's got a superb record at PGA National and that exposed Florida test has been the scene of victory for numerous Open champions.

Now he's starting to match his skills with British links golf and in the last two Opens he's finished fifth at Troon and 10th at Royal Portrush - his best two finishes in the tournament. 

Before that, Henley had missed the cut in five of his previous nine but it's quite heartening to know that his second best effort in that poor run was at Birkdale in 2017. Tied 37th doesn't sound like much but he was 10th at halfway and bounced back from a poor Saturday with a closing 67.

Henley finished fourth in the 2023 Masters and made the top 10 at the US Open and Open Championship in both 2024 and 2025.

He's getting better and better at majors. This really is a decent each-way price for the man who ranked 21st in Scrambling on the PGA Tour in 2025. 

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Bet 3: Back Cameron Young @ 80/181.00

At 12th in the Datagolf World Rankings we have Cameron Young but his price suggests he shouldn't be viewed as a top dozen player.

Perhaps that's because there's a perception that he hasn't had enough links experience.

But that claim can be quickly bunkered given that the New Yorker was runner-up on his Open debut at St Andrews.

Ah, but the Old Course is rather a law unto itself so perhaps form there needs to be viewed in isolation, you say.

That argument has some merit but Young then finished eighth at Hoylake in 2023 and was second after 54 holes. "I really enjoy this kind of golf," he said after a third-round 66.

With a third in the 2022 US PGA, a fourth in the 2025 US Open and a pair of top 10s at Augusta (2023 and 2024), Young has taken to majors like a duck to water so the price doesn't really make sense.

And, of course, he'll play the 2026 majors having starred in a Ryder Cup - he was joint-top USA scorer at Bethpage - and finally become a PGA Tour winner (a six-shot victory at the Wyndham) after a string of Sunday disappointments. 

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*You can follow me on Twitter @DaveTindallgolf

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Now read Dave's US PGA Championship 2026 preview here

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