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The Nedbank Golf Challenge is the first of two limited-field events to end the 2021-22 DP World Tour season. While some will head to Spain to compete in the first Qualifying School event since 2019, the top-60 in the Rolex Rankings head to Sun City for the first time since 2019. Well, not quite. This event doesn’t have quite the draw of previous years so the places are filled with those up to 76th in the rankings. The event has more players who finished outside the top-60 than players who finished inside the top-20. Often termed ‘Africa’s Major’, this event has always had the highest purse of any event in South Africa. It was the first to have a million dollar first prize which Ian Woosnam won in 1987. There were only eight in the winner-takes-all field that year and it remained a highly selective event until it became part of the end-of-season schedule on the DP World Tour in 2013. Four South Africans are in the field via invites, including Branden Grace who ranked 2nd in money earned on the LIV Golf events this year, but not his team-mates Louis Oosthuizen and Charl Schwartzel. The venue is the Gary Player Country Club, which opened in 1979 at Sun City. Measuring 7,819 yards, it is the longest course on the DP World Tour, but this is negated by the latitude and the range of tees available to the organisers. With Lee Westwood (three wins), Jim Furyk (two wins) and Bernhard Langer (two wins) among the list of multiple-winners, it is evident that this is not a ‘bomb-and-gauge' track. The course has been increasingly used for Southern Africa Tour events – three both this year and last year, including the co-sanctioned South African Open. It was even used four weeks ago for the Blue Label Challenge, though none of this week’s field played in that modified stableford event. But given the lack of South Africans in the field for Africa’s Major, there are few who have played here since 2019. With that caveat in mind, here are two angles that can be used this week. Angles to consider: 1. Approach stats are key indicators around this course This stats holds for regular Tour events at this venue as well as the NedBank Golf Challenge here. In the SunBet Challenge in June, the top-7 all ranked within the top-7 in the greens in regulation category. When Christian Bezuidenhout won the co-sanctioned South African Open in 2020, he led the field in greens in regulation. In terms of the Nedbank Golf Challenge, the winner has also led the field in greens in regulation in three of the seven years that the event has been part of the DP World Tour. In the inaugural year of strokes gained stats in 2019, the top-3 in strokes gained: tee-to-green also finished in the top-3 on the leaderboard. 2. It is the short game that is crucial The winners of the last three strokeplay events on this course – 2022 SunBet Challenge, 2022 Vodacom Origins Final, 2021 South African Open – all ranked 1st in scrambling that week. It is a similar story with the Nedbank Golf Challenge – either the contenders are very strong in terms of scrambling or putting, or both. Tommy Fleetwood in 2019 is the only winner here in the DP World era who did not either rank in the top-25 for scrambling or top-25 for putting average on Tour at the start of the week. For most players, it was a high ranking for their short game on the DP World Tour, for the 2015 winner, Marc Leishman, he was ranked 17th in putting average on the PGA Tour at the time. Selections The above angles have been used to create a shortlist from which the following players has been selected. Robert Macintyre
There are few better putters on the Tour than Macintyre, ranking in the top-10 for putting average, putts per round and one-putts. He has been in great form recently, winning the Italian Open in September and finishing in the top-20 in all four starts since, plus he has strong course form, shooting 65-68 over the weekend to finish 8th in 2019. Lucas Herbert
Siding with another very strong putter. Herbert led the PGA Tour across the following categories in 2021-22: strokes gained: putting, total putting, overall putting average, one-putt percentage, and putts per round. He finished 5th behind Macintyre in the Italian Open in his last DP World Tour start and even though he mostly plays on the PGA Tour, he has competed in 20 DP World Tour events since the start of 2020 and won two of them (2020 Dubai Desert Classic, 2021 Irish Open). Yannik Paul
A slightly different player in that Paul is much stronger tee-to-green than Macintyre and Herbert, but he still has a very good short game. He ranks inside the top-15 for strokes gained: tee to green, strokes gained: approach the green and greens in regulation on the DP World Tour, but also ranks inside the top-15 for scrambling as well. It had been a very impressive rookie season before he won the Mallorca Golf Open three weeks ago. He has little to fear in this field. Tips 0-3; -6.00pts 1pt e.w. Robert Macintyre 20/1 (Skybet, VBet 1/5 1-2-3-4-5-6) 32nd 1pt e.w. Lucas Herbert 25/1 (Quinnbet 1/4 1-2-3-4-5) 25th 1pt e.w. Yannik Paul 45/1 (Bet365 1/4 1-2-3-4-5) 25th
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