Nedbank Golf Challenge: Look to Lawrence to succeed in Sun City

• GIR and Scrambling the key stats

• Look to Wentworth, Paris and Doha for clues

• Read my Hero World Challenge preview here

Tournament History

The Nedbank Golf Challenge was first played in 1981 when Johnny Miller pocketed the then huge purse of $500,000.

It remained an exclusive 12-man invitational up until 11 years ago when it became an official co-sanctioned Sunshine and DP World Tour event for an extended field of 30 before it underwent an even more expansive revamp in 2016 when the field was increased to 72.

Venue

The Gary Player Country Club, Sun City, South Africa.

Course Details

Par 72, 7,819 yards
Stroke index in 2023 - 71.82

Gary Player's lengthy creation is a parkland course set in an extinct volcanic crater. It has fairly narrow kikuyu fairways and kikuyu rough and the small well-bunkered, bent grass greens usually run at around 11 on the stimpmeter.

In addition to hosting this tournament since day one, the Gary Player Country Club also hosted the Dimension Data Pro-Am on South Africa's Sunshine Tour up until 2009, it was the venue for the Sun City Challenge between 2012 and 2019 and it's hosted a Stableford event called the Blue Label Challenge since 2021.

It was also the venue for the 2020 and 2021 editions of the South African Open, won by Christiaan Bezuidenhout and Daniel van Tonder.

Weather Forecast

TV Coverage

Live on Sky Sports all four days, starting at 9:00 on Thursday.

Last Seven Winners with Pre-event Exchange Prices

2023 - Max Homa -19 11.010/1
2022 - Tommy Fleetwood -11 11.010/1
2020 & '21 - No event
2019 - Tommy Fleetwood -12 (playoff) 20.019/1
2018 - Lee Westwood -15 55.054/1
2017 - Branden Grace -11 18.017/1
2016 - Alex Noren -14 24.023/1
2015 - Marc Leishman -19 80.079/1

What Will it Take to Win the Nedbank Golf Challenge?

Branden Grace's victory seven years ago was bizarre. He shot a six-over-par 42 on the front nine on Friday, he ranked 63^rd for Driving Distance, 54^th for Driving Accuracy, 31^st for Greens In Regulation and 12^th for Scrambling but he did putt well and he made more birdies than anyone else in the field.

Even so, after that 'hiccup' in round two and with stats that poor, it was a remarkable achievement so it's probably a renewal to ignore.

Tommy Fleetwood only ranked 31^st for Driving Distance and 28^th for Driving Accuracy when defending the title two years ago but an excellent tee game is usually an essential prerequisite and he drove the ball far better in 2019 - ranking seventh for DD and eighth for DA.

Last year's winner, Max Homa, ranked 25^th for DD, 16^th for DA and 11^th for Strokes Gained: Off the Tee.

As it's at altitude, the ball travels around 10% further than it does at sea level, so Sun City doesn't play as long as the yardage suggests, but it's still a long course and getting it out there off the tee is important. And so is finding the fairways...

The Kikuyu rough is notoriously hard to play from and missing fairways with regularity makes it impossible to find the number of greens necessary to compete. Lee Westwood has always been regarded as one of the best drivers in the world so it's no coincidence that he's prospered here, winning the Nedbank three times in total.

Total Driving is a good stat to consider but Greens In Regulation and Scrambling are usually the most important.

South African Open winner, Bezuidenhout, ranked first for Greens In Regulation and second for Scrambling, van Tonder ranked ninth for GIR and first for Scrambling, and Grace looks like a real anomaly because, the nine Nedbank winners since it became a DP World Tour event have ranked fifth, second, eighth, fourth, 31^st, first, first, third and first.

And although Grace only ranked 31^st in 2017, the next four on the leaderboard ranked fifth, first, 11^th and second so GIR is definitely a key stat.

Having ranked 17^th in 2022, Fleetwood only ranked 40^th for Scrambling in 2019 but the runner-up five years ago, Marcus Kinhult, ranked sixth, and Jason Scrivener and Bernd Wiesberger, who finished tied for third, ranked first and fourth.

The six Nedbank winners before Fleetwood ranked 13^th, first, first, third, 12^th and 14^th for Scrambling, Homa ranked second 12 months ago, and as already mentioned, Bezuidenhout and van Tonder ranked second and first.

Bezuidenhout and van Tonder both ranked first for Par 4 Scoring, as did Homa 12 months ago, and Fleetwood ranked second in 2022 but historically, making hay on the par fives has been crucial here and five of the last eight Nedbank winners played the long holes better than anyone else in the field.

Is There an Angle In?

This used to be a notoriously bad event for debutants and not just because there were only one or two in the small fields of 12.

Back in 2012, five of the 12 were making their debut but only one of the five, Bill Haas, who finished third, finished inside the top-six and in 2013 more than half the field were playing Sun City for the first time and yet only one of them, Brendon de Jonge, managed to finish inside the top-six but all that changed when it became a DP World Tour event 11 years ago.

The 2013 winner, Thomas Bjorn, had only ever played Sun City twice before and that was in the last century in the Dimension Data, 16 years prior to his win, so he can't have been too familiar with the venue, the next three winners, as well as the 2016 runner-up, Jeunghun Wang, who traded at around 1.330/100 in-running, were all playing the course for the first time, as was Homa when he won last year.

From a course form correlation perspective, a number of course winners (and seconds) have form at both Wentworth and Doha, home of the Qatar Masters.

Marc Leishman and Max Homa have never played Wentworth and Fleetwood's best finish there is sixth, but he sat second with a round to go there last year before Ryan Fox (who traded at a low of 1.618/13 here in 2022) took the title and the five Sun City winners before him have either won the BMW PGA Championship or they've traded at odds-on to win it.

The 2019 Qatar Masters winner, Justin Harding was eighth here in 2017, sixth a year later and sixth in the South African Open in 2021, having led by four with a round to go, the 2017 Qatar Masters winner, Wang, arguably should have won here in 2016 and Markus Kinhult, who was beaten by Fleetwood in extra time here in 2019 has finished third at Doha twice.

Grace, the 2017 winner of this event, won back-to-back Qatar Masters titles in 2015 and 2016. The two-time Sun City winner, Sergio Garcia (who also traded at odds-on here in 2018), won the 2014 edition of the Qatar Masters at Doha, and Thomas Bjorn, Henrik Stenson, Ernie Els, and Henrik Stenson have all won at both venues. There are worse places to start than Doha for clues and Paris National is another to consider...

Fleetwood, Alex Noren and Martin Kaymer have all won both the Nedbank and the Open de France recently and when Kaymer took the title in Paris he beat the three-time Nedbank winner, Westwood, in a playoff, so it looks a strong link.

Is There an Identikit Winner?

Multiple winners are fairly common. When winning two years ago, Fleetwood became the ninth man to win the event twice, the seventh to successfully defend the title and four men - David Frost, Nick Price, Ernie Els, and Lee Westwood - have all won the event three times.

This hasn't been a good event for outsiders. Westwood went off at 55.054/1 in 2018 and Leishman was matched at 80.079/1 when he won nine years ago but he was the biggest priced winner in many a year, so longshots have a poor record.

Winner's Position and Exchange Price Pre-Round Four

2023 - Max Homa - Led by one 2.111/10
2022 - Tommy Fleetwood - T7th - trailing by three 19.018/1
2019 - Tommy Fleetwood - T12th - trailing by six 90.089/1
2018 - Lee Westwood T3rd - trailing by three 12.5
2017 - Branden Grace T3rd - trailing by three 5.69/2
2016 - Alex Noren - T4th - trailing by six 22.021/1
2015 - Marc Leishman - led by a stroke 2.3211/8

In-Play Tactics

In its old, limited field format very few winners came from off the pace in the Nedbank but that made sense. Not only were they small fields but they were small fields containing very high-quality golfers. The very best would separate themselves from the majority in the small field and more often than not, that would be that but since the format has changed and the fields have been expanded, a new pattern has emerged...

The classy Homa won from the front last year but the five Nedbank winners before him trailed by six, three, three, six and three strokes with a round to go and players going odds-on and getting beat is now commonplace.

It's a really tough golf course and your game can unravel fast so it's a great place to take on short ones in-running.

Look to Lawrence to succeed in Sun City

The favourite, Corey Connors, makes no appeal on debut and the defending champion, Max Homa, has been out of form for a long time but I was happy to chance Thriston Lawrence at 21.020/1.

The South African has been in exceptional form throughout the summer (including a fourth-place finish in the Open) and although his form at the Gary Player Country Club is nothing to write home about, he plays well in his homeland, where he's already won twice on the DP World Tour and as recently as August this year on the Sunshine Tour.

I'll have two more selections for the Find Me a 100 Winner column later today or tomorrow, but Lawrence is my only other selection before the off.

Now read my Hero World Challenge preview here

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