Golf Central

A high-class field, including four of the world’s top twenty players, has assembled for the Australian PGA Championship at the Hyatt Regency Coolum on Queensland Sunshine Coast. They will compete for a prize fund of $1.4 million and the Joe Kirkwood Cup. Here are my tips for success…

Rory Sabbatini @ 12/1 with Betfred: I’m backing the combative Sabbatini to show his class. The Colonial winner he overcame a poor opening round of 76 to finish fifth amongst a great field at the Nedbank Golf Challenge. If he plays to the brilliant standard he displayed at the FedEx play-offs at the end of the main US Tour he has every chance of victory here.

Peter Lonard @ 14/1 with Coral: Lonard returned after a two-month competitive absence to finish in an impressive fifth place at the Mastercard Masters and he has a great track record at Coolum. In 2002 Lonard shared honours in the event when the playoff between he and Jarrod Moseley was called off due to darkness, he then won the event in 2004 before finishing runner up to O’Hern last year.

John Senden @ 16/1 with Paddy Power: Senden has previously done well at Coolum, he was third in 1999 and sixth on his last two visits (2004 and 2005). Two weeks ago   he recovered from a poor opening round at the Mastercard Masters to finish a respectable 15th and that suggests he can add another home-soil win to the Aussie Open crown he captured last year.

The European Tour heads to South Africa this week for the Alfred Dunhill Championship, an event co-sanctioned by the European and Sunshine Tours. It takes place at the Leopard Creek Golf Club in Mpumalanga and I’m backing three natives to shine on home soil…

Ernie Els @ 10/3 with Betfred: World number five Ernie Els is going for his fourth success in this event and has also finished runner-up on two occasions. The Big Easy was up against a much stronger field in last weeks Nedbank Golf Challenge and finished a respectable third. He has won two of his last four events in South Africa, including last years South African Open, and is eager to triumph again.

Charl Schwartzel @ 12/1 with Stan James: Schwartzel has finished top of the Sunshine Tour Order of Merit for the past three years and requires a big performance at Leopard Creek to stay in contention for a fourth straight title. If course form is anything to go by then Schwartzel has every chance, he claimed his maiden European Tour success when he won this event at the start of the 2005 schedule and has finished runner-up in each of the last two years.

On this day in 1956, Costantino Rocca was born in Bergamo, Italy, and would go on to be an unlikely and beloved hero at the Open Championship and Ryder Cups - and the most successful Italian golfer of all time.

Like so many golf stars from humble beginnings, Rocca started as a caddie and had to return to European Tour Qualifying School several times. But eventually, the Italian with the broad smile and hunched shoulders started making it: He ended up winning five times on the tour, including the 1996 Volvo PGA Championship. Now 51, Rocca has already won twice on the senior circuit.

But Rocca is best known, of course, for one of the greatest moments in Open Championship history: The miraculous putt he made at St Andrews and the fairytale finish that nearly came of it ...

What the hell do lousy fathers, Sir Bob Charles and Happy Gilmore have to do with one another (other than that Happy would make a pretty bad dad)? Carry on here, and find out more in our essential list of stuff that helps us be marginally smarter and more worldy wise than we were seven days ago...

The Gary Player Country Club in Sun City, South Africa played host to the Nedbank Golf Challenge where twelve of the games top stars competed for a first competed for a first prize $1.2 million. Unfortunately my tips to do the business didn’t quite manage it…

Ernie Els @ 10/3: Els played solid golf and had been in contention but 72 in the final round wasn’t low enough to sustain his challenge. He finished in third place on 11 under par, five shots off the lead.
Retief Goosen @ 10/1: I thought that Goosen might find a bit of form and his starting price of 10/1 represented a bit of value. It didn’t, and Goosen finished in last place on 10 over par.

I should have advised you to back:

Trevor Immelman @ 12/1: Immelman was only included in the field after Sergio Garcia pulled out a few days before tee-off and he made the most of his opportunity. He started the final day in a tie for the lead with Justin Rose and survived a nervous finish of three successive bogeys to close on 16 under par and win by one stroke from an equally jittery Rose.