World Super 6 Perth	Subscribe

The European Tour stays in Australia for a second week and it’s the second event in a row with a novel format. After an event in which both men and women competed on the same course and for the same money, this week’s event mixes both strokeplay and matchplay elements. Forget last week’s gender politics, this is made-for-TV golf.

The format is standard for the first three days: a 36-hole cut with the top-65 and ties progressing to the weekend. However, after the 3^rd round, the top-24 then progress to a six-hole match play knockout phase on Sunday. A ‘Shootout Hole’ is used to settle ties for the last places in the knockout phase.

Finishing inside the top-8 in the strokeplay phase does have its advantages – they will automatically progress to the 2^nd knockout round. With five rounds of six-holes (plus any extra holes) to be played in one day, it can be rather gruelling, mentally as well as physically, so a bye in the first round should be an advantage.

This is the third World Super 6 Perth at Lake Karrinyup Golf Club and, having been the home to four Perth Internationals and two Johnnie Walker Classics before that, there is a reasonable amount of course history to peruse this week.

The course isn’t particularly long – it is less than 7,200 yards – and the fairways are wide, but given the number of dog-legs, it is not particularly clear that driving distance or accuracy has had any significance in previous years.

The course is described as having undulating greens and tricky run-off areas, so that should suggest that scrambling should be an important statistic this week, but the evidence is rather mixed. For example, last year’s winner, Kiradech Aphibarnrat, ranked 75^th in that statistic last year and the leader after the strokeplay rounds, Prom Meesawat, ranked 117^th in that statistic.

The headline pointers can be found elsewhere this week.

Angles to consider

1. Look to the top of market

Despite the increased element of luck given the format, players at the top of the market have won this event in both years: last year’s winner, Aphibarnrat, was the joint-favourite pre-tournament and the 2017 winner, Brett Rumford, was 9^th in the market pre-tournament.

This also extends to the previous events at Lake Karrinyup as well. The 2016 Perth International was won by the favourite, Louis Oosthuizen; the 2014 Perth International was won by Thorborn Olesen, who was 9^th in the market pre-tournament; the 2012 Perth International was won by Bo Van Pelt, who was 4^th in the market pre-tournament; while the 2002 and 2003 Johnnie Walker Classics were won by Retief Goosen and Ernie Els who were, respectively, ranked 9^th and 2^nd in the World Rankings at the start of the week that they won here.

The one event not mentioned is the 2013 Perth International won by Jin Jeong who was, admittedly, a rank outsider. However, he only won via a playoff with Ross Fisher who was 3^rd in the market pre-tournament.

This week's odds can be found here: https://www.tour-tips.com/odds.htm

2. Ball-strikers fare well here

Given that winners at Lake Karrinyup are almost invariably to be found at the top of the market, this angle should be no surprise. If the run-off areas are tricky here, it is clearly important to hit the green, so look to players with good greens in regulation stats.

Last year’s 54-hole leader ranked 1^st in greens in regulation that week; in 2017, the European Tour didn’t collate the stats, but the winner in 2016 also ranked 1^st in greens in regulation that week. In fact, across the other three Perth Internationals and two Johnnie Walker Classics here, the winner always ranked inside the top-8 for greens in regulation that week.

Greens in regulation stats for the European Tour can be found here: https://www.tour-tips.com/Euro/TourStatsDetail.aspx?table_code=7&table_desc=Greens+in+Regulation&table_usercontrol=GreensInRegulation.ascx  

3. Look south early in the season

Of the eight previous Tour events played at Lake Karrinyup, five have been played January or February and three have been played in October. All five events played at the start of the year have been won by a player from the Southern Hemisphere.

Early season form can be erratic on the European Tour and there are two good reasons for this: (1) the Tour moves from continent to continent over the first four months so there are many different timezones/climates/course conditions played and this leads to an advantage for those who have greater familiarity with those timezones/climates/course conditions; (2) the winter months in Europe are not favourable to practicing so those without winter retreats in warmer climates will tend to be less prepared for these early-year events.

Australians with European Tour Cards who are playing this week can be found here: https://www.tour-tips.com/Australasian/current-event-news.asp  

4. Look for form last week

As angle (2) followed on from angle (1), so angle (4) follows on from angle (3). Last year, Aphibarnrat had finished 27^th in the Maybank Championship the previous week; in 2017, Rumford had finished 18^th in the Victorian Open the previous week; in 2016, Oosthuizen had finished 12^th in the Maybank Championship the previous week.

The previous three Perth Internationals were all played in October, so getting rid of any contention rust would not be an issue, but going to back to 2003 and 2002, Els had won two weeks beforehand and Goosen had finished 2^nd the week before winning at Lake Karrinyup.

The Current Form can be found here: https://www.tour-tips.com/Australasian/Stats.aspx?table=Current

Selections

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

Jason Scrivener

With finishes of 16^th, 7^th and 5^th (last week) on the European Tour in 2019, Scrivener has the form to warrant his position as the general second-favourite this week (three firms make him the sole favourite in their books).

He missed out on the knockout stage last year by a single shot, but he finished 4^th in 2017, having been 2^nd in the 54-hole strokeplay stage, and finished 3^rd in the 2016 Perth International when it was a pure strokeplay event.

And the player, who moves to Perth when he was ten years old, fits all four angles – he currently ranks 7^th in Greens in Regulation, 5^th in Strokes Gained: Approach and 7^th in Strokes Gained: Tee to Green so far this season on the European Tour. He certainly warrants his position at the top of the market.

Ryan Fox

Back the New Zealander who was the joint-favourite pre-tournament with Aphibarnrat last year. He would finish alongside Scrivener and one shot out of the knockout phase on that occasion, just as he lost out in the ‘Shootout Hole’ in 2017, but he does have a top-10 finish here (2014).

Given that he ranks inside the top-10 for greens in regulation on the European Tour both this season and last season, it is evident that this course should suit his game even though he has narrowly missed out on the knockout phases in the last two year.

He has been in good form already this season, finishing 6^th in the Saudi International and though he didn’t survive last week’s 3^rd-round cut, he had been 9^th after 36 holes before falling back to 37^th in the difficult playing conditions on Saturday. That 37^th place finish and a failure to reach the knockout phase in this event mean that he is lower down the market than would otherwise be the case against such a field, but he is still generally in the top-six.

Tips  1-1; +49.50pts

1.5pts e.w. Jason Scrivener 18/1 e.w. (Paddy Power, Betfair Sportsbook ¼ 1-2-3-4)  26th

1.5pts e.w. Ryan Fox 28/1 e.w. (Bet365, Marathonbet, Sportingbet ¼ 1-2-3-4)  1st