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The DP World Tour completes its two-week Spanish Spring leg at another course that hosted the Final Stage European Tour Qualifying School for many years. That event makes a welcome return later this year after a three-year absence, and the Final Stage will again be held at last week’s venue. However, it wasn’t on the script for the inaugural DP World Tour schedule to see the start of the European section appear tailor-made for journeymen pros. They should have been in Japan last week for the ISPS Handa Championship and in China this week for return of the China Open. At least with the past Qualifying School events here, there is plenty of course experience. This venue hosted that event from 2008 to 2016 when four of the six rounds in those event were played at the Stadium course, but the venue has also hosted the Sarazen World Open in 1999, the Open de Espana in 2000, 2009 and 2014 and also the PGA Catalunya Resort Championship on the Nordic Golf League since 2016. The Stadium course is undulating and tree-lined with water a feature on a few holes. This sounds like Valderrama, but it isn’t as though. Six rounds at a Valderrama-type course would be too much for any Qualifying School so, while it is still a challenging course, it is considered to be a very fair test of golfing ability. In 2014, the Real Federación Española de Golf selected this course in their bid for this year’s Ryder Cup. Since then, there has also been a €1m upgrading of this course and its facilities. This should be a very good test for this week’s players. There is an important caveat that, despite the extensive course history, only the four European Tour events have playing stats recorded. However, here are three angles offered to identify players who should contend. Angles to consider: 1. Fairways and greens When Thomas Bjorn won here in 1999, three of the top-four ranked inside the top-11 for greens in regulation and two of the top-four ranked inside the top-5 for driving accuracy. When Brian Davis won in 2000, Peter Baker and Gary Orr top-ranked for greens in regulation and finished 3rd and 6th respectively. When Thomas Levet won in 2004, he top-ranked for greens in regulation alongside Thomas Bjorn who finished 3rd, while the top-ranked player for driving accuracy, Fabrizio Zanotti, finished 2nd. Finally, when Miguel Angel Jimenez won in 2014, his tee-to-green stats weren’t great, presumably as he was 50 years old at the time, but he completed a quartet of winners who were notable for having very strong all-round tee-to-green games. 2. Course form should be important in this event There aren’t many in this field who have played in the Nordic Golf League events here in recent years, so this is mostly based on the Qualifying School Final Stage event that was played here until 2016. Pablo Larrazabal won last week (see angle below) despite having never played in the three Qualifying School events at last week’s venue, but this week’s course history is much more extensive. Anyone who can fare well in those events at this venue must be extremely good under pressure and, to use Keith Elliott’s terminology, have a very strong positive mental association with this venue. 3. Recent form should also be important There had been a concern that recent form wouldn’t have mattered much last week given the three-week hiatus; the players would be Tour rusty. That wasn’t the case. Larrazabal won for the second time in six weeks with his run of finishes since February reading: 6th-3rd-1st-mc-5th-1st. And it was also the case with the three overnight leaders, who all finished in the top-3. Adrian Otaegui had finished the top-5 in the previous Tour event, the Qatar Masters, Aaron Cockerill had finished 2nd-18th-21st in his last three starts, while Hennie Du Plessis had also finished inside the top-30 in Qatar and then finished 2nd in the Limpopo Championship the following week. Selections The above angles have been used to create a shortlist from which the following players has been selected. Jason Scrivener
Scrivener did play last week, but not in the ISPS Handa Championship in Spain. He finished in the top-10 in the Zurich Classic of New Orleans alongside Jason Day. He finished 27th in Qatar and in the top-10 in his previous DP World Tour start so his form is good. He does have a good history on this course – 18th in the 2014 Qualifying School and 7th the following year and given his game strengths (he ranked inside the top-25 for driving accuracy on the European Tour last year), he looks a good fit for this course. Victor Perez
Perez is another in good form and is coming off a top-10 finish (last week’s ISPS Handa Championship in Spain). He made a rapid ascent through the minor Tours so hasn’t completed on this course previously, but he did win the Challenge de Espana at the similarly tree-lined Izki Golf and his game strengths align perfectly with this course: he has ranked inside the top-10 in greens in regulation on this Tour in each of the last two years. Mikko Korhonen
In terms of previous form on this course, it is difficult to rival Korhonen who won the Qualifying School in 2014, finished 15th in the 2014 Open de Espana here, as well as 3rd, 9th and 22nd in 2010, 2012 and 2013 Qualifying Schools, respectively. He finished in the top-15 last week and ranks 5th in driving accuracy on Tour this year, while ranking inside the top-30 for strokes gained: approach the green last year. He meets all the angles to again finish highly on this course Tips 0-3; -6.00pts 1pt e.w. Jason Scrivener 80/1 (10Bet, Sport Nation 1/4 1-2-3-4-5) 18th 1pt e.w. Victor Perez 40/1 (Coral, Ladbrokes 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8) mc 1pt e.w. Mikko Korhonen 50/1 (Coral, Ladbrokes 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8) 33rd
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