Australian PGA Championship	Subscribe

The year’s final event on either the European or PGA Tour is the Australian PGA Championship, an event steeped in over 100 years of history. It sounds a fitting way to end the year.

Unfortunately, the non-Australian Tour pros don’t agree. None of the 21 overseas golfers who competed in the Presidents Cup have stayed on to compete in this event and the two-week gap between the Mauritius Open and this event has resulted in few regular European Tour pros competing this week.

The event has been co-sanctioned with the European Tour since 2015, but in recognition that few regular European Tour pros make Australia part of their travel itinerary, it has always been played in the same week as another co-sanctioned event with the Southern Africa Tour. This year, there is no corresponding event on another continent, but it has still failed to convince many to travel from Europe.

But this is still an event steeped in history, played on the same course since 2013 which means that there is plenty of course form on which to base tipping angles. One note of caution is that the course underwent a major re-design in 2014/15, so maybe it is just the last four years that are worth looking at.

The course is not particularly long, measuring 7,364 yards, but the fairways are tree-lined, water features on 13 holes and the greens are firm and undulating.

Angles to consider:

1. Class matters

Well-known players win this event. PGA Tour regular, Cameron Smith, is attempting the three-peat this week while the previous two winners had been Harold Varner and Nathan Holman. All four winners in the European Tour co-sanctioned age were ranked inside the top-20 in that week’s field for World Rankings. Before 2015, the list of winners since 2000 comprised of Robert Allenby (4), Peter Lonard (3), Jarrod Moseley, Peter Senior (2), Nick O’Hern, Geoff Ogilvy, Greg Chalmers (2), Daniel Popovic and Adam Scott. Of these, only Popovic was not a regular Tour winner.

2. Course form also matters

The above list of multiple winners suggests that this angle was just as strong at the Hyatt Coolum Resort, but the effect is even stronger at the Royal Pines Resort. The 2015 winner, Nathan Holman, had achieved a top-15 in his previous start on this course; in 2016, Harold Varner won the event having finished 2^nd via a playoff on this course the previous year; in 2017, Cameron Smith won the event, having finished 35^th, 9^th, 5^th and 15^th in the first four years at Royal Pines and then he successfully defended the title in 2018.

3. And short game also matters

Given that the greens are undulating and firm, this should be expected. The double-champion, Cameron Smith’s strength lies in his short game so that is clearly supportive for the last two years and this was also evidence in the previous year, 2016, when the five of the top-6 places on the leaderboard were filled with players who ranked inside the top-10 for scrambling.

Selections

The above angles have been used to create a shortlist from which the following players have been selected.

Ryan Fox

The big-hitting Australian’s form was poor in summer, but has improved in the last few months and he has been talking positively about the turnaround in his game in recent interviews. He did win the last European Tour event held in Australia, the ISPS Handa World Super 6 Perth, in February and is a multiple-winner at this level. His form on this course is patchy, but with finishes of 9^th and 11^th in the last five years, there is enough to suggest that his class will prevail on this course.

Brad Kennedy

There are no concerns about Kennedy’s form as the Japan Tour regular has finished 6^th-5^th-5^th-13^th-8^th-49^th-2^nd in his last seven starts. He had very good course form on the previous course and has only played in two of six events at Royal Pines due to scheduling issue with the Japan Tour, but he finished 13^th in 2014 and 31^st (8^th at the cut) in 2016, so there is enough support for his game to fit this course here. That is confirmed by the fact that he has ranked inside the top-5 in scrambling in each of the last five years on the Japan Tour.

Wade Ormsby

Ormsby is another with strong scrambling stats – he ranked 3^rd on the European Tour in that category and 7^th in strokes gained: around the green in the 2018-19 season. Those short game skills have served him well on this course previously: He lost out in a playoff in 2014 having led after rounds 2, 3 and 4 and he again finished in the top-10 in 2017. He won the Hong Kong Open in the 2017-18 season so he has proven that he can win at this level.

Tips  1-2; +3.00pts

1pts e.w. Ryan Fox 28/1 (BetFred 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7)  27th

1pt e.w. Brad Kennedy 25/1 (Paddy Power, Betfair Sportsbook, Coral, BetFred, Boyle Sports 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7)  19th

1pt e.w. Wade Ormsby 40/1 (Paddy Power, Betfair Sportsbook, Coral 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7)  3rd