After the glitz and glamour of a historic The Open last week, the DP World Tour returns to a touch of normality when it crosses the border to head to Lancashire for the Cazoo Classic, a relatively new event or a reincarnation of an old one depending on where you look.
Calum Hill won’t have cared what the past suggested when he waltzed to the title last year but he isn’t in the field this week so we are guaranteed a new name on the trophy come the end of what should be a competitive week.
Recent Winners
2021 – Calum Hill
The Course
We move from the London Club in Kent to Hillside Golf Club in Southport this week so for the third week in succession we will be playing links golf and although there is some rain and storms forecast in the evenings throughout the week, the heatwave that has gone through the UK will ensure the course plays firm and fast, very much in keeping with what we saw at St Andrews. The track is a par 72 which measures 7,109 yards and with the firmness of it, it will play much shorter than that.
The course was last used for the British Masters in 2019 which was won by Marcus Kinhult so a number of the field will have played it in competitive form but the track will be much different even to then. The key a few years ago was hitting greens in regulation and a hot putter, very much in keeping with links golf, but this week a good short game feels like it is going to be essential with the ball rolling a lot more than it did in 2019.
The Field
When you consider that we have just had a Rolex Series event followed by the final major of the season, there are still some decent names in the field this week. Robert MacIntyre is probably the current biggest one among them although the likes of Thorbjorn Olesen and Ewen Ferguson have won tournaments this season and will be looking to build on their title tally. We also have some players who went well last week in the field here not least Thriston Lawrence.
Plenty of talented British players will look to use their knowledge of conditions to their advantage with those such as Ross Fisher, Matthew Jordan, Eddie Pepperell, Richie Ramsay and Marcus Armitage among them. Veterans such as Edoardo Molinari, Adrian Otaegui and Soren Kjeldsen are also in the field this week. Given what we’ve had recently credit must go to the organisers for getting such a competitive field together here.
Market Leaders
Robert MacIntyre is the 14/1 favourite to win the tournament this week. In terms of potential and links credentials I think that is a fair position for him to hold, particularly when you consider that he was the runner up to Kinhult here three years ago. Those are the positives but the obvious negative is a lack of form. The Scot has one top 10 all season and that comes in 16 events. He made the cut last week without figuring in contention and missed the cut the week before in Scotland. He’s too short for me.
Two South African players are sitting second in the betting at 20/1. They are Oliver Bekker and Thriston Lawrence. The latter has already won at this level and has four top 10s to his name this season including a third in Ireland three weeks ago. This is his fifth straight week though which is a concern. Bekker has five top 10 finishes on the DP World Tour but you wonder if his involvement in the LIV Tour is going to count against him either with negative crowd support or the media.
Thorbjorn Olesen and Romain Langasque are next in the market at 22/1. Olesen won the last time the tour stopped in England at the British Masters and he has a fair amount of links pedigree having won events like the Dunhill Links. The Dane was eighth in Ireland so he’s in decent enough form. Langasque has five top 10 finishes in his last 11 DP World Tour starts so he is a man in form but he missed the cut in the British Masters here three years ago which might be significant.
Adrian Otaegui is the only other player in the field shorter than 28/1 this week. He has been slotted into the market at 25/1 and might fancy his chances with the course playing the way it is with the imagination and creativity he has, not to mention his excellent wedge game. His form has taken a dip since he finished second in Spain in April and the fact he is only allowed in here after an appeal to the courts would mean he’s unlikely to be universally popular which might also count against him.
Main Bets
I’ll go with a couple of main bets this week with the first of them coming in the form of Alexander Bjork, a player who has a good all-round game which should be hugely suited to the test that is ahead of him this week. Bjork has plenty of links experience and some good results mixed in there, the pick of which was his seventh placed finish in the Dutch Open earlier in the year. Bjork eats up greens in regulation for fun and is a very good putter. His short game is more than acceptable as well and coming from Sweden he’ll be comfortable in the breeze. He’s an automatic first main bet.
The second main bet is Richard Mansell, a player who was ninth in that Dutch Open, his second top 10 in two years on that course and third in his next start at the European Open. While that Green Eagles track isn’t a links course as such, it is pretty exposed and has humungous greens like links tracks do. The key to those results were that he hits a lot of greens and putted very well and they are the two recipes that should provide success around here. Mansell made the cut at The Open last week and finished under par for the week which was no mean effort considering he hadn’t players for three weeks. He ranked 23 in greens in regulation on the week which wasn’t too shabby in that company. In a much lesser class here I think he has a chance of delivering the goods.
Outsiders
I’ll go with three outsiders this week as well with the first of those coming in the form of the Spanish player Santiago Tarrio. Tarrio has shown bits of form in recent times finishing fourth in the Scandinavian Mixed, which might not actually be the worst form guide here, and T16 in Ireland which shows he can play in tougher conditions. In the last three cuts he has made he has finished 10-6-16 for GIR and has been putting well from time to time too. If it all comes together here he could go very well.
Jack Senior should know this place pretty well considering his home course is just up the road in Fleetwood. He would surely have played the links courses in this part of Lancashire a few times and having won in Scotland and Northern Ireland on the Challenge Tour we know he is capable of handling the British weather. Senior doesn’t have a huge amount of form to speak of this year but he was tenth in the Scottish Open last year and had a couple more top 10s in Spain after that. Although 2022 hasn’t gone to plan he was second after 54 holes in a good field in Ireland earlier in the month before it all went tits up in the final round but that shows he is hitting the ball well and at a decent price I think home comforts could serve him well here.
Another player who I think can enjoy home comforts is Bryce Easton. You wouldn’t necessarily think he is at home this week but this is the course he is affiliated to so he should have played it quite a few times and will know all the misses and everything else. Easton has been plying his trade on the Challenge Tour recently and the South Africa tour prior to that and although he has had mixed results I’m hoping being on a course he knows well will bring his best game out. If it does then this is a player who finished in the top 10 at Celtic Manor last season as well as at the Hero Open and Mallorca Open. He was also T16 at Fairmont St Andrews in 2010 and then T10 there last year so there is enough in his overall profile to suggest he could be a big price here.
Tips
Back A.Bjork to win Cazoo Classic (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 26.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-7)
Back R.Mansell to win Cazoo Classic (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 29.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-7)
Back J.Senior to win Cazoo Classic (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 67.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-7)
Back S.Tarrio to win Cazoo Classic (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 67.00 with Boylesports (1/5 1-8)
Back him here:
Back B.Easton to win Cazoo Classic (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 151.00 with Betway (1/5 1-7)
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