The Punter's In-Play Blog: Hatton the halfway play in Dubai

15:30 - November 13, 2026 - Hatton fancied to thrive without Race to Dubai distractions

The second round of the Austin Championship is underway on the PGA Tour, and I'll look at that event tomorrow, once they've reached the halfway stage, but for now I'm concentrating on the week's DP World Tour event - the DP World Tour Championship - where two players are tied at the top at halfway.

Here's the state of play with prices to back at 15:10.

Rory McIlroy -5 2.47/5
Tyrrell Hatton -5 5.49/2
Kristoffer Reitan -4 11.521/2
Joost Luiten -4 34.033/1
Victor Perez -3 28.027/1
Freddy Schott -3 40.039/1
Mikael Lindberg -3 42.041/1
Jon Rahm -2 11.010/1
David Puig -2 36.035/1
Jayden Schaper -2 55.054/1
Eugenio Chacarra -1 48.047/1
-1 and 75.074/1 bar

A halfway total of -5 at the Earth Course would usually mean you're outside the top 10 and probably too far back to win the DP World Tour Championship but it's enough for Rory McIlroy and Tyrrell Hatton to head into the weekend tied for the lead this year.

With the rough a little longer than usual and the wind gusting, scoring has been much tougher than it normally is and McIlroy said after his second round that the course is playing as tough as he can remember.

The tough conditions have created a fairly bunched leaderboard, with 14 players under-par and within four of the leading pair.

More benign conditions are predicted over the weekend so the scoring should improve and that may well favour the frontrunners.

Sitting on -6, last year's winner, Matt Fitzpatrick, sat tied for 13^th and six off the lead at this stage and he was trading at 50.049/1 on the Betfair Exchange but he was an unusual winner as up with the pace is the place to be here most years.

McIlroy sat tied for second and just one off the lead after 36 holes when he won here for a third time two years ago and the 2023 winner, Nicolai Hojgaard, was two clear at halfway.

As many as four of the first five winners here were also in front after 36 holes and prior to last year, although he was leading after round one, Robert Karlsson, who beat Ian Poulter in a play-off 16 years ago, was the only winner not to be sitting inside the top eight places at halfway. He shot a three-over-par 75 on Friday to drop to 12th, trailing by five, before bouncing back over the weekend.

Fitzpatrick, last year, and Karlsson in 2010, are the only course winners not to be within four strokes of the lead at this stage and Jon Rahm in 2022 and McIlroy 11 years ago, are the only other winners not to be within three of the lead.

Rory had threatened to run away with the event when he birdied four of his first 10 holes today and he was matched at as low as 1.664/6 but, as he so often does, instead of pulling away, he hit the brakes.

Rory bogeyed three of his next seven holes and he needed a birdie at the last to draw back alongside Hatton at the top of the leaderboard.

In search of his fifth Race to Dubai title in-a-row, and his eighth in total, Rory has a bit of pressure to overcome over the weekend and the fact that he can still win the R2D if he finishes second and Eugenio Chacarra (currently tied for 11^th) finishes worse than tied third with one other, may be a factor.

Jon Rahm has an outside chance of winning the R2D, but he needs to win and to hope that Chacarra finishes ninth or worse, and that McIlroy is third or worse. Patrick Reed needs to finish worse than tied third to stop Rahm but that's a forgone conclusion gives he sits 49^th and 13 off the lead at halfway.

Rahm was my sole selection before the off and trailing by just three, he's fairly priced now at 10/111.00 but it's hard to look past the front two.

Rory has been tied for the lead at this stage 14 times previously and he has an impressive enough record given he's gone on to win five times.

Hatton, who was tied with Rahm at this stage in Abu Dhabi last week, before he went on to finish second to the Spaniard, is two from seven when tied at the top through 36 holes so his record isn't quite as good as Rory's but he's the halfway value at 9/25.50 on the Betfair Exchange.

The fact that Hatton can't win the R2D means he has slightly less pressure to deal with over the next two days and the fact that he ranks highly for the two main stats at halfway bodes well too.

Hatton ranks second for Greens In Regulation and third for Putting Average whereas Rory only ranks 10^th and 22^nd for those two key metrics with 36 holes to play.

Bookmark Betting.Betfair for golf betting tips every week