Normal DP World Tour service resumes after the PGA Championship. The tour heads to the Rinkven INternational Golf Club this week for the Soudal Open. Damien Kayat previews.
2024 DP World Tour
Soudal Open
Rinkven International Golf Club
23 – 26 May
Europeans made a decent fist of it at Valhalla, with Norwegian Viktor Hovland coming closest to disrupting the wonderful clash between Xander Schauffele and Bryson DeChambeau. Wouldn’t it have been great for golf scribes if Scandinavian Hovland had finished the job at Valhalla?
Hovland enters the halls of Valhalla, etc, etc. In any event, I was extremely happy to see the criminally underrated Schauffele finally get his flowers. His triumph was tarnished somewhat by the entire Scottie Scheffler debacle.
But nonetheless, it’s about time that the metronomic American joined the pantheon of Major champions. I never came out too strong in the upper end of last week’s markets but was pretty pleased to catch Justin Rose as the top-placed Englishman. Let’s hope I can carry that momentum over into this week.
Soudal Open
The DP World Tour returns this week with the recently reimagined Soudal Open. This is essentially a rebranded version of the old Belgian Open. The Belgian Open was first staged in 1910 and was won by Frenchman Arnaud Massey (who was also the first non-Briton to win the Open Championship).
It has never been a firmly entrenched part of the European Tour and was staged under the guise of the Belgian Knockout in 2018 and 2019. 2022 saw the event reconfigured as a 72-hole stroke-play contest under its current moniker: the Soudal Open.
The event returns to Rinkvin International Golf Club, host of the two editions of the Belgian Knockout and the first two editions of this newly reconfigured Soudal Open.
Rinkven International Golf Club
Originally designed by Paul Rolin in 1985, the Rinkvin is a parkland affair that drifts between tree-lined holes and more exposed holes. This week’s layout is a composite of the North and South courses (seemingly the same combination used for the first two renewals).
The course is generally flat with Poa Annua fairways and smaller than average Bentgrass greens. There are some tight fairways that require precision from the tee. Measuring just a smidge under 7,000 yards, this course is almost parodically short by contemporary standards. All eight of the Belgian Knockout semi-finalists favoured accuracy over distance.
But Sam Horsfield’s victory in 2022 seemed to mark a shift away from accuracy (he ranked fifth for Driving Distance and 58th for Driving Accuracy). Last year’s winner- Simon Forsstrom- only ranked 62nd for Driving Accuracy. He did finish first in Scrambling, and the three best scramblers all finished inside the top eight two years ago.
Players will need to tidy up well around these fairly quaint putting surfaces. I would still favour accuracy over distance this week (perhaps the last two seasons were outliers). But perhaps it’s more important to look at GIR and players who can recover if they just miss these small green complexes.
The Contenders
You always have to worry about a DP World Tour event where Jordan Smith is the market leader. The Englishman has only picked up two top 10’s this entire year! That tells you something about the ‘quality’ of this week’s field.
Defending champion Simon Forsstrom is in attendance while former Ryder Cupper Thomas Pieters adds a bit of pizzaz to proceedings. Adrian Otaegui won the recent Volvo China Open while Yannick Paul has been a consistent presence on DP World Tour leaderboards for some time.
Past Winners
2023: Simon Forsstrom (-17)
2022: Sam Horsfield (-13)
To Win Outright:
Jordan Smith 22/1 | Yannick Paul 25/1 | Thomas Pieters 25/1 | Adrian Otaegui 28/1 | Thriston Lawrence 28/1
Value Bets
Alex Fitzpatrick- To Win 28/1 | To Place 6/1
It’s surely a matter of time until Alex Fitzpatrick finally breaks through on the tour. Matt Fitzpatrick’s younger brother made some really meaningful strides last year, winning on the Challenge Tour and finishing 17th at the Open Championship. He also finished runner-up at the ISPS Handa and fifth at Crans-sur-Sierre. He has registered five top 25’s in eight starts this season, finishing 11th alongside brother Matt at the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. He missed the cut by a shot here last season but he returns a much more well-rounded player this time around.
Johannes Veerman- To Win 60/1 | To Place 13/1
32-year-old American Johannes Veerman could represent great value this week. He won his only DP World Tour event at a similarly understrength event (the 2021 D&D Real Czech Masters). Veerman has been playing very consistent golf this year, making the cut in every event this season. But he has only really started to flourish recently, finishing T2 in India and T8 at the Volvo China Open. Currently ranked inside the top 30 in the Race to Dubai standings, Veerman is more than capable of showing up in this field.
The Man to Beat- Thomas Pieters- To Win 25/1 | To Place 11/2
This throws my whole ‘accuracy is more important than power’ spiel right out of the window. But Pieters- on his day- is just different class to the rest of this field. The former Ryder Cupper struggled with his initial transition to LIV (those fields are getting deeper each season). He has earned his spot in this field courtesy of the ‘National Spot’ loophole and his form has been trending well in recent weeks. He was ninth at LIV Miami, 14th at LIV Adelaide and fifth last time out in Singapore. Crucially, he ranked 13th, 14th and 1st in all those events for Scrambling. He also has course experience, finishing 9th at the 2022 Soudal Open (when he was in pretty terrible form).
