Singh, Scott head strong field in India

BY Bruce Young | Asian Tour | 2008 Johnnie Walker Classic | Preview | 26 Feb 2008

It seems it never rains but pours when it comes to golf in India. In a country relatively starved of grand scale tournament golf until now, the capital New Delhi will play host to a significant tournament for the third week in the last month when the Johnnie Walker Classic is played at the DLF Golf and Country Club in Gurgaon in the south-west of the city.

The DLF Country Club is an Arnold Palmer designed facility built in the late 1990’s and is part of the golf course development mini boom in the New Delhi region. Courses by Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Greg Norman amongst others are now part of the golfing landscape of the region. The DLF Golf and Country Club is the centrepoint of a massive residential development being undertaken by DLF some 12 kilometres from the city centre of New Delhi.

Three weeks ago the historical New Delhi Golf Club played host to the Emaar-MGF Indian Masters, last week the SAIL Open was played a little closer to the city on the Greg Norman designed Jaypee Greens layout in Noida and now this week the Johnnie Walker Classic.

This event is tri-sanctioned between the European, Australasian and Asian Tours and has significant benefits for the winner. A win this week would give those golfers the chance to play in Europe for at least two years and could perhaps be the making of their careers as it was with the winner in 2007. Given the unknowns and vagaries of playing on the subcontinent this event provides more hurdles than other events of its kind and is therefore perhaps a more even playing field.

The defending champion is the surprise 2007 winner Anton Haig, who won in a playoff over Richard Sterne and Oliver Wilson in Phuket in Thailand but the South African has certainly struggled since that victory. There has been a glimpse of hope of late with a very good 7th place in Qatar and a 10th place finish in his homeland at the recent Telekom PGA Championship.

The tournament favourite and leading world ranked player in the field is Australian Adam Scott who has spaced his tournaments in 2008 so much so that this will be just his fifth start this season. He won three starts ago at the Qatar Masters and had reasonable weeks at the Northern River Trust Open and in Arizona last week. His brilliant win in Qatar leaves him the obvious choice on paper at least.

Vijay Singh made the quarter finals last week in Arizona before going down to Justin Leonard but he will be more at home this week than many, his capacity to do well wherever he plays is a distinct advantage.

Also feeling at home this week, but for more obvious reasons, are the leading Indian golfers, Jyoti Rhandawa, Jeev Milkha Singh and Arjun Atwal while the recent winner of the Indian Masters, S.S.P Chowrasia, is looking for a unique double of winning not only the first European Tour event held in his country but also the second.

Ian Poulter has been a little slow getting into stride in 2008 after a very good finish to the end of 2007. Poulter made it through only the opening round in Arizona last week before going down narrowly to K.J. Choi but he has shown a capacity to perform well internationally including a win at the Dunlop Phoenix in Japan last year. India should hold no fears for him and he might be ready to play well again.

Graeme McDowell was not at a level where he could earn a start at the Accenture but he has been playing well in recent weeks including a 12th place at the Indian Masters. He appears to be closing in on contention if not a victory and could do very well this week.

The Australasian contingent is strong in both numbers and chances in addition to Scott. Last week’s surprise winner Ewan Porter is in the field, one of the last in as a result of his emphatic win at Moonah Links.

New Zealander Mark Brown is rapidly becoming the golfer many thought he would be more than ten years ago. He won his first professional event last week in New Delhi and had a good week in Indonesia a week earlier.

Scott Hend is one of the leading players in Asia in recent times and having finished runner up to Brown last week he is in the sort of form where he might have another good week.

David Smail, Peter O’Malley, Marcus Fraser, Marc Leishman, Greg Chalmers and Paul Sheehan are perhaps the best of a long list of others from the Australasian Tour who might do well in the US$2,500,000 event.