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The news at the start of the week was the surprise late entry of Tommy Fleetwood. Given that the U.S. Open is being held next week, that is a very surprising decision, particularly as this course will not play anything like a U.S. Open-style venue. The field is notably thin in terms of top-tier European Tour players given this scheduling issue. Those that will play this week will be thankful of a complete change in venue from last week’s battle of attrition around Valderrama. The Portugal Masters has always been a late season event since its inception in 2007 and between 2012 and 2016, plus 2019, this is was the venue for the final event of the Regular Season which means that this is the typically the last chance for many players to secure their Tour Card for the next season. That is enough pressure on the players that week so this is a course that does not put too much pressure on players’ games. This event takes place on a resort-style course that will not overly challenge players’ games as well as their nerves. This was the site of the European Tour’s first 59 when Oliver Fisher reached that mark though he only finished 7th. Low scoring will be the norm this week. There has been some modifications to the course in recent years – a new strain of Bermuda grass for the rough, some re-positioning of bunkers and some strategically-placed trees on three holes to limit the degree to which players can cut the corner on dog-legs – but it is still largely the same course. The fairways are wide, the rough is not particularly penal and the greens are large. With so many consecutive years at this venue, there are a number of angles that can be used this week. Angles to consider: 1. This is an event for outsiders Last year, as between 2012 and 2016, the Tour’s leading players would be playing in the HSBC Champions the following week, so there has rarely been a top-class field in this event. That creates an open event and this is reflected in the odds of the last ten winners here: no winner has been shorter than 50/1. Steven Brown, for example, won last year at odds of 150/1. His Betfair price was 320 prior to the event. 2. Length off the tee helps around the Dom Pedro Victoria Golf Course David Lynn is regularly cited as the last example of a long-hitter not winning this event (in 2013), but at the time of his win, he ranked only four places lower in the European Tour’s driving distance stats as he did in terms of driving accuracy. Alexander Levy (2014, ranked 13th in driving distance on the European Tour at the time) and Lucas Bjerregaard (2017, 9th) are the clearest examples of this angle, but Andy Sullivan is the only exception in the last five years to the rule that players were ranked higher in driving distance than driving accuracy on Tour, and he was still not a particularly short-hitter as he ranked 11th in driving distance during the week of his win. While it was a very hot putter that won the event for Brown last year, it is notable that he ranked 44 places higher in driving distance on the European Tour rankings than in driving accuracy at the start of the week. 3. The short game is not a good indicator of success around the Dom Pedro Victoria Golf Course A somewhat anti-angle for this one. Since the winner typically ranks very highly for putting in this event (1st-5th-1st-1st-4th-1st-7th-1st for putts per GIR in the last eight years), it is commonly argued that the winner here will be a good putter. That is not necessarily so. However, it is true for all low-scoring events and that is the case here. But low-scoring can be a product of good putting, good approach plays or simply very true greens. Angles that are considered pre-event should corroborate the evidence post-event, both before and after those events and not solely focus on the stats during the tournament. Normally, that is sufficient, but there is a divergence in this event. Consider those last eight winners and their putts per GIR rankings outlined above. Prior to the tournament, they had the following ranking on the European Tour for putts per GIR: 170th-173rd-98th-10th-107th-65th-152nd-34th. Padraig Harrington (2016 winner) was clearly a very good putter and Shane Lowry (2012 winner) was a decent putter, but looking at Steven Brown at 170th and Tom Lewis at 173rd in the European Tour's putting average rankings in the last two years would not have helped to identity them as potential winners if putting ability was a key angle. The same can also be said for scrambling. Here are those eight winners' ranking on the European Tour at the start of their winning week: 180th-110th-209th-41st-92nd-104th-111th-75th. Selections The above angles have been used to create a shortlist from which the following player has been selected. Joel Stalter Stalter returned to the Tour last week after resting for three weeks after he finished 15th in the Austrian Open, won the Euram Bank Open and finished 28th in the Hero Open. He missed the cut by two shots having been in the wrong side of the draw – the Thursday morning starters averaged over two shots better than the Thursday afternoon starters over the first two days. However, it is not a bad thing to have headed out of Valderrama at the earlier opportunity. That was a brutal week. This week should suit him much better. He may not feature in the official European Tour rankings on europeantour.com, but the stats on this site show that he is one of the longer hitters on the European Tour (he ranks inside the top-20 for driving distance in 2020, see https://www.tour-tips.com/Euro/TourStatsDetail.aspx?table_code=2&table_desc=Driving%20Distance&table_usercontrol=DrivingDistance.ascx). Stalter does have good history here – he finished 12th in 2017 – and does fit the profile being available at goods despite having won on the European Tour only eight weeks ago. Tips 0-1; -2.00pts 1pt e.w. Joel Stalter 200/1 (Paddy Power, Betfair Sportsbook 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7) mc
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