Written by Stephen Moloney (www.twitter.com/TheCheeky9)
By the time his ball rattled the bottom of the cup for par on the 9th green at Muirfield Village, it all-but-seemed guaranteed that the proceeding 9 holes would be nothing more than a triumphant processional march back to the clubhouse for Jon Rahm. I mean, heading to the 10th tee he had an EIGHT shot lead over his nearest rival in Ryan Palmer; he hadn’t dropped a single shot on the front 9 when everyone else was dropping them like they’d holes in their pockets; he had three good birdie looks coming up at the 11th, 14th & 15th; and he was just looking in complete control over every facet of his game – basically, it was all beautifully poised for the 18th green at ‘Jack’s Place’ to be a more-than-fitting coronation site for the ‘King of the Rolex Series’ to, not only be crowned as the newest Memorial champion but as the official number one player in the world.
Of course, as we know, by the time the Spaniard walked off the 14th green he’d dropped a sphincter-tightening four shots since making the turn and seen his once handsome lead cut down to just three single shots – which, I think we can agree, was ‘no muy bueno’.
However, in the end, despite a storm delay and a post-round two-shot penalty for inadvertently moving his ball all of – *GASP* – three millimetres back on the 16th before pulling off, what will be, one of the famous Memorial shots in history, Jon Rahm survived one of the toughest weeks we’ve seen all year and emerged from the strongest field ever assembled at a PGA Tour event as not only the best player over the four days but the best player on the planet.
As the PGA Tour rolls on to Minnesota for the 3M Open, though, I, instead, turn my attention back across the Atlantic after six long (and incredibly successful) weeks focusing on the States for the much-anticipated opening event in the upcoming ‘UK Swing’, the Betfred British Masters hosted by Lee Westwood at Close House … because summoning astral projections for tournaments over here requires a LOT less ‘Oracles’ Broth’ than when they’re over in the States – so let’s get into it.
Field Report
Below you will find the top 30 in the ‘Race to Dubai’ rankings as of this week. If they have a ✅ alongside their name, they’re in the field this week; if they have an 🆇 alongside their name it means they’re not in the field this week:
| Patrick Reed | 🆇 | Min Woo Lee | ✅ |
| Lee Westwood | ✅ | Gavin Green | 🆇 |
| Lucas Herbert | 🆇 | Brandon Stone | ✅ |
| Graeme McDowell | 🆇 | Rasmus Højgaard | ✅ |
| Tommy Fleetwood | 🆇 | Adam Scott | 🆇 |
| Erik van Rooyen | 🆇 | Ross Fisher | ✅ |
| Victor Perez | 🆇 | Ryan Fox | ✅ |
| Christiaan Bezuidenhout | 🆇 | Rory McIlroy | 🆇 |
| Branden Grace | 🆇 | Sergio Garcia | 🆇 |
| Pablo Larrazábal | ✅ | Thomas Pieters | 🆇 |
| Matt Fitzpatrick | 🆇 | David Drysdale | ✅ |
| Louis Oosthuizen | 🆇 | Shaun Norris | 🆇 |
| Sami Välimäki | ✅ | Renato Paratore | ✅ |
| Jorge Campillo | 🆇 | Thomas Detry | ✅ |
| Jon Rahm | 🆇 | Joel Sjöholm | ✅ |
Notable entrants in the field from just outside the top 30 include:
Marcus Kinhult. Mikko Korhonen. Eddie Pepperell. Alexander Levy. Guido Migliozzi. Marc Warren. Adri Arnaus. Andy Sullivan. Andrew Johnston. Sam Horsfield. Adrian Otaegui. Oliver Fisher. Paul Dunne. Francesco Laporta. Connor Syme. Benjamin Poke. Robin Sciot-Siegriest. Wil Besseling. Nicolai Højgaard.
The Yardage Book
(i) Below you will find the scorecard for the Colt Course at Close House. For each hole I’ve listed its par and what shape best suits it off the tee (for right-handers):
| Front 9 | Close House Golf Resort | Back 9 |
| #1: Par 4 – Either | Heddon-On-The-Wall, England | #10: Par 3 – Draw |
| #2: Par 4 – Either | 6,921 yards | #11: Par 4 – Draw |
| #3: Par 4 – Fade | #12: Par 4 – Draw | |
| #4: Par 4 – Either | #13: Par 5 – Either | |
| #5: Par 3 – Either | #14: Par 4 – Fade | |
| #6: Par 5 – Either | #15: Par 4 – Either | |
| #7: Par 4 – Fade | #16: Par 4 – Either | |
| #8: Par 3 – Either | #17: Par 4 – Fade | |
| #9: Par 4 – Fade | #18: Par 3 – Either | |
| Out: 35 | Par 70 | In: 35 |
(ii) Pretty much ranked in the ‘Top 100 UK Courses’ since its inception, ‘The Colt Course’ at Close House is one of the special courses in England’s North-East. Designed to be as sympathetic as possible to the deeply historic land upon which it is built, the Colt weaves its way through ancient forest and over a multitude of hills to provide a challenging test not only to your golf game but your stamina as well. What this adherence to the natural layout of the terrain ends up creating, however, is a course filled with a varying mixture of elevated tee shots and steep uphill drives to wide, cambering fairways lined with natural fescue rough that reflects the original brief to create a golf course that was very much “Old English” in design.
(iii) Whilst not a massively long course, because of that aforementioned hilly terrain, it is going to make any uphill holes play that little bit longer and, obviously, any downhill ones play a whole lot shorter – so being able to gauge those distance changes, whether it be with woods or irons, is going to be a must this week.
(iv) Though sections of the Colt Course are squirreled away inside thickets of trees, large swathes of it lie incredibly exposed to the elements, so if the wind gets up or any squalls of bad weather roll in – which is a real possibility – then it could very quickly notch up the difficulty level if you’re not able to adjust to the elements and are somewhat one-dimensional with how you flight the ball.
(v) With their severe undulations, steep run-offs and the fact they aren’t all that massively big, the greens at the Colt Course are not to be trifled with, so if you find yourself out of position in the fairway or catch a nasty lie in the rough, then par will very quickly become a good score. Now, of course, how much of a test the greens will actually end up being depends on what approach the tournament directors take, i.e. will they look to ease the players back into competition and guarantee some low scores for the watching audience at home.
(vi) Below you will find the top 20 and ties for the British Masters when it was last held at Close House in 2017:
| 2017 | |
| Paul Dunne -20 | George Coetzee -10 |
| Rory McIlroy -17 | Stephen Gallacher -10 |
| Robert Karlsson -16 | Marc Warren -10 |
| Florian Fritsch -14 | Lee Westwood -10 |
| David Lingmerth -14 | Kiradech Aphibarnrat -9 |
| Graeme Storm -14 | Mikko Ilonen -9 |
| Shane Lowry -13 | Martin Kaymer -9 |
| Lucas Bjerregaard -12 | Mikko Korhonen -9 |
| Tyrrell Hatton -12 | José-Filipe Lima -9 |
| Richie Ramsay -12 | Mike Lorenzo-Vera -9 |
| Nacho Elvira -11 | |
| Matthew Fitzpatrick -11 | |
| Chris Hanson -11 | |
| Ian Poulter -11 | |
| Felipe Aguilar -10 |
The Oracles’ Fourball
Sam Horsfield
As was the case with the Charles Schwab Challenge back in June, trying to predict who might do well this week after such an extended period of inactivity is really difficult. I mean, sure, you could look to the back-to-back tournaments in Austria over the past two weeks to give you some idea as to who’s ‘in form’, but not everyone who’ll be in the field this week played in those events – for those people, the British Masters is their first taste of competitive action after months of just being able to practice.
Now, whilst there is a BIG difference between practicing and teeing-it-up in competition, one player who seemed to be staying particularly sharp during lockdown was England’s Sam Horsfield, who, after shooting a 59 at Streamsong Black back in May, went on to shoot a 58 at Championsgate Country Club in July. And, like, don’t get it wrong, those courses aren’t pushovers. They’re both super challenging, Floridian tracks – Streamsong, in particular. So, when I see Sam teeing it up this week – a young golfer who’s long been touted to do big things in the game – with his ability to drive it long (he’s 6th on the European Tour with an average ‘Driving Distance’ of 327.57 yards) and obvious ability to go crazy low when he’s on, then the 23-year old could well go on to finally deliver on that potential we’ve heard so much about but have yet to see consistently play-out over four days.
Guido Migliozzi
After a stellar debut season on the European Tour wherein he clocked up two wins (Magical Kenyan Open & Belgian Knockout), a couple top 10’s & a few top 20’s, Guido’s 2020 had gotten off to a much slower start in comparison as from the five events he’d played before lockdown, the young Italian had only made the cut in one of them – at the Oman Open back in March.
But it’s that performance at the Oman Open which makes me think Guido could possibly contend this week. See, for those of you who watched that event, the wind was a massive factor all week. What helped Guido clock up a T-4 finish there, however, was his ability to control his ball flight – most notably, his ability to flight the ball way down, both off-the-tee with a piercing stinger and from the fairway with controlled, knocked down irons.
So, when I see him heading to Close House, a course very exposed to the wind, then if it gets up – which it’s looking right now like it might – then having that ability and confidence to keep the ball down out of the air and use the terrain will be a massive advantage – so much so, that he could very rapidly turn his 2020 season around by racking up his third win on Tour.
Connor Syme
It’s been an all-round solid season for Connor Syme. From the eight events he’s played, he’s only failed to make the weekend twice and otherwise picked up finishes of T-11, T-9, T-22, T-52, T-10 & T-4, with the latter of those finishes coming just two weeks ago at the Austrian Open.
But when you look at the numbers Connor has racked up this season from a stats perspective, those finishes don’t really come as much of a surprise. He’s had an average ‘Driving Distance’ of 317.91 yards, yet still managed to be incredibly accurate with all that distance, as an accuracy percentage of 71.42% sees him 4th overall on Tour. Plus, making the most of his frequent visits to the short grass, Connor has been peppering greens all season to such an extent that he’s gotten himself to 4th as well in GIR % with a healthy total of 76.62%. Essentially, he’s taken the old golf adage of ‘fairways & greens’ being a good thing to heart this season and seen it pay off as a result.
Now, despite sitting 10th in ‘Scoring Average’ (69.83), if one was to nitpick over Connor’s game, you could say his putting and scrambling might do with being improved a touch, but like I said that’s nitpicking. Ultimately, though, if the Scot can bring his solid tee-to-green game to Close House and get hot with the putter early on in the week, then his consistency from earlier in the season might well be rewarded with his very first European Tour victory. And if he can get that first one out of the way? Then I think plenty more will follow because this guy has the potential to be a serious player.
Adri Arnaus
Since earning his European Tour card for the 2018/19 season, the talented 25-year old Arnaus has racked up seven top 10 finishes on tour, including three runner-up finishes (the Magical Kenyan Open, the Andalucia Masters & D+D Real Czech Masters) and, only this year, clocked up a lucrative tie for 3rd at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic – all in all, great playing.
What have been the keys to the young Spaniard’s success? Well, this season he’s been one of the longest hitters on tour (averaging 320.34 yards off-the-tee), hit a nice amount of greens (71.52% sees him sitting 35th in GIR %) and his ‘Stroke Average’ has been a decent 70.87 – all relatively close to what he produced in 2019 (apart from his ‘Driving Distance’, which has climbed a massive 12 yards since last year). Looking at the finishes he’s managed to produce this season, however, that pursuit of increased distance may well be the reason he hasn’t contended as much as last year for his ‘Driving Accuracy’ has gone way down, falling from 54.76% in 2019 to just 46.42% in 2020.
Following his T-11 finish at the Austrian Open two weeks ago, though – a course that requires a more surgical approach than just sheer brute force to post a decent score -if he can bring that same game to Close House and exploit his length wisely, then Adri could definitely grab the debut win he’s come so close to netting in the last two years. Plus, after seeing his compatriot and friend, Jon Rahm, win the Memorial and ascend to #1 in the world, I can’t think of a better motivation to head into a golf tournament with – because if Rahm can do what he’s done, what’s stopping Adri Arnaus from making the most of his obvious ability?
Title Photo Credit: Close House