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Links lovers excel at Doha
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Form at the Earth Course looks key
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Read my Phoenix Open preview here
Tournament History
Sky Sports pundit, Andrew Coltart, won the first edition of the Qatar Masters back in 1998 so this will be the 28th edition.
The tournament was staged at Education City in both 2020 and 2021 but we're back to the event's original venue- Doha Golf Club - for the fourth year in-a-row.
The Qatar Masters is the fifth event in-a-row in the Middle East before the DP World Tour takes a week off. As was the case last year, after a week off, the Tour will resume in two weeks' time at the Kenya Open.
Venue
Doha Golf Club, Doha, Qatar
Course Details
Par 72, 7,532 yards
Stroke Index in 2024 - 72.19
Doha was designed by Peter Harradine, the man also responsible for the Abu Dhabi Golf Club and Al Hamra, the Ras Al Khaimah Championship venue two weeks ago.
In between the 2019 and 2022 editions the course was revamped and there were two significant changes.
The ninth and 18th greens (both par fives) were combined to form one big green, and all the greens were changed from Bermuda to a strain of paspalum called dynasty grass.
Gary McGlinchey, the General Manager of Doha Golf Club had this to say prior to the changes being made. "The greens were constructed in 1996, grass technology has come a long way since then and the paspalum dynasty grass we have selected doesn't mind the TSE water we are now forced to use."
In addition to the grass type changing, most of the greens were expanded back to their original size and reinstated back to their original slopes and elevations.

Both nines open and close with par fives and water is in-play on six holes (3, 8, 9, 13, 15 and 18).
The four par fives usually average below par but the drivable par four 16th, which averaged just 3.48 last year, is the best opportunity to score.
The course is very exposed, and high winds can have a big say on the outcome so keeping an eye on the weather forecasts is essential.
Blustery conditions caused chaos over the weekend in 2022 with as many as five players trading at 2.89/5 or below, although the winner, Ewen Ferguson, was the only man to go odds-on.
TV Coverage
Live on Sky Sports all for days, starting at 9:00 on Thursday in the UK.
Last Eight Winners with Pre-event Exchange Prices
2024 - Rikuya Hoshino -14 55.054/1
2023 - Sami Valimaki -18 85.084/1
2022 - Ewen Ferguson -7 300.0299/1
2021 - Antoine Rosner -8 30.029/1 (Education City)
2020 - Jorge Campillo -13 200.0199/1 (playoff- Education City)
2019 - Justin Harding -13 60.059/1
2018 - Eddie Pepperell -18 85.084/1
2017 - Jeunghun Wang -16 40.039/1 (playoff)
What Will it Take to Win the Qatar Masters?
Driving Distance used to be a key stat at Doha, and Sami Valimaki ranked seventh when winning here in 2023, but the four course winners before him, Ewen Ferguson, Justin Harding, Eddie Pepperell and Jeunghun Wang, only ranked 46th, 31st, 77th and 37th for DD and last year's winner, Rikuya Hoshino, ranked only 33rd.
That's quite a change given 11 of the 12 winners before Wang in 2017 ranked inside the top 15 for that stat.
Pepperell ranked third for Driving Accuracy six years ago but that's not a stat to dwell on either given the previous four winners had ranked 54th, 61st, 44th and 40th and the last four winners have ranked only 38th, 17th, 21st and 33rd.

Hoshino ranked 16th for Greens In Regulation last year, the front two ranked third and eighth in 2023 and the first and second ranked tied for 14th for GIR in 2022 but the four course winners before Ferguson only ranked 45th, 16th, 26th and 19th.
Again, that's quite a transformation given prior to the last seven renewals here, nine of the ten winners had ranked inside the top seven for that stat.
As many as ten of the last 14 winners have ranked inside the top-ten for Putts per GIR and the odd four out - Valimaki in 2023, Ferguson in 2022, Wang in 2017 and Sergio Garcia in 2014 - only ranked 22nd, 16th, 15th, and 18th so a solid week with the putter is key.
We only have four years' worth of Strokes Gained data at Doha but for what it's worth, Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green looks to be the most important stat.
The first three home last year ranked 12th, fourth and sixth, the playoff protagonists in 2023 ranked second and fifth and although Ferguson only ranked 18th, the next three on the leaderboard ranked fourth, eighth and nineth. Marcus Armitage, who finished tied for fifth behind Ferguson, topped the SG: Tee-to-Green rankings and the 2019 winner, Harding, ranked third for Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green.
Doha is very exposed, so excellent wind exponents tend to fare well here year after year.
Is There an Angle In?
A large bank of course form is far from imperative at Doha.
When Eddie Pepperell won here in 2018, he had previous course form figures reading MC-63-4-MC, so he had plenty of experience and one very good performance in the bag already but the last two winners had played here only once previously and the three before them had never played Doha before.
Hoshino finished 36th on debut in 2023 and Valimaki had finished only 40th on his only previous visit so I certainly wouldn't put anyone off backing a course debutant or someone with very little course form.
South Africans have a good record at Doha. When Harding won here in 2019, he became the fifth South African to win the Qatar Masters and three South Africans - George Coetzee, Christiaan Bezuidenhout and Erik Van Rooyen - finished tied for second.
Debutants and South Africans are clearly worth considering and so too are former winners.
When Branden Grace successfully defended in 2016, he became the third to win the title twice in its short history and we could very easily have seen a few more two-time winners...
In addition to Grace's back-to-back wins, Paul Lawrie won the event in both 1999 and 2012 and Adam Scott has also taken the title twice - in 2002 and 2008. Henrik Stenson won the event in 2006 and he's also been second three times, the 2020 winner, Campillo, hit a low of 1.330/100 in October, and Alvaro Quiros is a two-time runner-up as well as a winner here. Robert Karlsson has a first and second to his name and Sergio Garcia finished second eight years ago before he took the title 12 months later.
Links Lovers Excel at Doha
Doha winners, Henrik Stenson, Ernie Els and Paul Lawrie have all won the Open Championship and Sergio Garcia, Thomas Bjorn and Adam Scott arguably all should have done.
Given he shot the first 62 in major championship history at the Open at Royal Birkdale in 2017, Grace boosts the links angle-in too and so does the 2016 second, Thorbjorn Olesen, the 2015 runner-up, Marc Warren, and the 2018 winner, Pepperell.
Grace has also won at the Fancourt Links in South Africa and like past Qatar Masters winners, Lawrie and Robert Karlsson, Grace and Thorbjorn Olesen are both former winners of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. Grace and Warren have also both lost a playoff at the Scottish Open at the Castle Stuart Links and Pepperell was denied only by a ridiculous 60 in round four of the 2018 Scottish Open at the Gullane Links by South Africa's Brandon Stone.
Many fine links exponents have performed well here, and I suspect it's the wide-open feel of the course and the fact that the wind often blows - mirroring the sort of conditions encountered on the links.
Look to the Earth Course for clues
Although Alvaro Quiros is the only man to win both this event and the Portugal Masters at Dom Pedro Victoria, a significant number of players have played well at both venues so that's another angle in to consider and form around the similarly exposed Heritage Golf Club at the Mauritius Open has also held up well in Qatar but the course that appears to correlate best now is the Earth Course.
Last year's winner, Hoshino, finished only tied 28th in the DP World Tour Championship in November but he sat tied for fourth after round one and the two winners before him had form at the Earth Course.
Sami Valimaki has finished inside the top five there and the 2022 winner, Ewen Ferguson, the top ten.

Doha winners Robert Karlsson, Alvaro Quiro and Henrik Stenson have also won at the Earth Course and plenty of players have played well at both venues.
Winner's Position and Exchange Price Pre-Round Four
2024 - Rikuya Hoshino - tied for the lead 5.95/1
2023 - Sami Valimaki led by a stroke 3.002/1
2022 - Ewen Ferguson - tied 7th - trailing by three 38.037/1
2021 - Antoine Rozner tied 4th - trailing by three 7.26/1 (Ed' City)
2020 - Jorge Campillo led by a stroke 3.3512/5 (Ed' City)
2019 - Justin Harding tied 10th - trailing by three 38.037/1
2018 - Eddie Pepperell tied for the lead 3.1511/5
2017 - Jeunghun Wang led by three strokes 1.9310/11
In-Play Tactics
With windy weather so often a factor, a slow start can be overcome at Doha.
Hosino was always up with the pace last year but Rasmus Hojgaard was tied for the lead after round three having sat tied for 68th and six off the lead after round one.
The 2017 winner, Wang, trailed by five after round one and four of the 25 course winners to date have been as far as seven off the lead after the opening round. And three winners, Ernie Els in 2005, Adam Scott in 2008 and Sergio Garcia in 2014, were seven back at halfway.
Els was still five back with a round to go and Scott and Garcia still trailed by three, as did Harding in 2019 and Ferguson in 2022 but every other winner has been within two strokes with a round to go and 15 of the 25 winners were in front after three rounds.
If you're betting in-running, bear in mind that the 12th, 13th and 15th holes are all tricky but after that the players face the drivable par four at 16, the 17th, which is by far the easiest of the four par threes, and the 18th, which is a reachable par five which has averaged 4.75 or 4.76 in each of the last three editions.
Chris Wood won the event with an eagle at the 72nd hole 12 years ago, Grace eagled the 16th on his way to winning nine years ago and Ferguson, who was matched at a whopping 880.0879/1 in-running in 2022, despite never trailing by any more than three strokes in-between rounds, eagled 16 before birdying the last to win by a stroke.
Market Leaders
Last week's winner in Bahrain, Laurie Canter, is this week's favourite and he's highly likely to contend.
Canter finished third in the Dubai Desert Classic prior to last week's playoff success so he's clearly in fine fettle. He has form at Doha and at the two correlating courses mentioned above - Dom Pedro Victoria and the Earth Course.
Canter led the DP World Championship with a round to go in 2020 before finishing fifth and he's subsequently finished 27th and 14th there.
He also finished second to George Coetzee in Portugal back in 2020 and 12th at Doha on his second visit in 2022, having missed the cut on debut back in 2018.
That was an eye-catching performance given he was without a top 20 finish in any of his eight previous starts and he deserves his place at the head of the market. But whether he'll putt well enough to win is debatable.
Although he walked off with the trophy last week, he only ranked 50th for Putting Average and 51st for Strokes Gained: Putting and that's a little off-putting.
Jordan Smith, who won the last ever edition of the Portugal Masters at Dom Pedro Victoria, has Doha form figures reading 6-MC-62-MC-5, but he is hard to fancy given his current form, especially on the greens.
The 32-year-old Englishman is yet to finish inside the top 20 in three outings in the Middle east this year and his putting figures aren't great.
The course specialist, Jorge Campillo, and the recent Nedbank winner, Johannes Veerman, are next up and both are trading at around 30.029/1. But that looks short enough to me.
Count on Cantero
I'll have at least one selection for the Find Me a 100 Winner column but for now I'm going with just one pick before the off - the bang in-form Ivan Cantero.
After finishing 31st at the Dubai Desert Classic, the 28-year-old Spaniard finished fifth at the Ras Al Khaimah Championship and he'll feel like he should have at least made the playoff in Bahrain last week.
Cantero sat tied for 82nd place after a 73 in round one but fought back brilliantly on Friday with the lowest round of the day - a bogey-free eight under-par 64 - and would have contended the playoff if he hadn't bogeyed the 72nd hole after finding sand off the tee.
The big hitter has ranked eighth, 10th and 12th for Putting Avergage in each of his last three starts and the last three weeks have demonstrated his liking for desert golf.