Tiger back, Sergio to surge
February 25th 2009 07:22
So, here he is 200 and something days since he was last seen hobbling goff into the sunset with the US Open trophy, Tiger Woods is back.
And after practicing ahead of this week’s world matchplay championship, Woods said his reconstructed knee was stronger and more reliable than it had been before he all but disintegrated the joint courtesy of his crushing swing.
And perilously for his rivals, Woods said he spent most of his rehab time working on his short game (mainly because he couldn’t smash the driver) and that he’s come up with a wider array of shots designed to get him out of trouble.
Those new shots will come to the fore at Augusta for the Masters in April. Until then, we’ll be keen to see just how well Woods gets himself around the course. He hasn’t walked 18 holes too often in recent weeks and while his general fitness is sure to be pretty good I think his golf fitness – the ability to walk 18 holes and concentrate for four and half hours – might see Woods struggle at the matchplay.
His first-up opponent Brendan Jones of Australia shouldn’t trouble Woods, but that’s what we would have said about Woods countryman Nick O’Hern, who has previously beaten Woods in this event when seeded 64th.
But I doubt Woods will get right to the end of this event which requires seven rounds of golf – five to get to the final and then 36 holes in the final.
So it might be a bit much, even for Tiger.
I’m going to make my picks based on the brackets the players are.
Woods leads the Jones bracket but there’s a guy in there who has beaten Woods in matchplay: Mike Weir, who head Woods in a singles match at the President’s Cup four years ago. He might not have to meet Woods but if he does I’ll back him.
The Hogan bracket is headed by Phil Mickelson but Lefty was so erratic on his way to winning the Northern Trust Open that I cannot see him stringing together the required number of good rounds to win this event. So I’ve gone for Englishman Lee Westwood, who is a real birdie maker and will hang tough in every match he plays.
The Player bracket features a number of great players like Sergio Garcia, Paul Casey, Adam Scott and Boo Weekley. It’s hard to find a standout here but I’ll go for Garcia based purely on his consistent form this year and he loves matchplay.
The Snead bracket is wide open and I find it hard to label a player here. If forced to go for someone, I’d look at Anthony Kim, purely for his ability to make enough birdies to beat anyone.
So my semifinalists are: Weir, Westwood, Garcia and Kim, with Garcia to win it all.
While the matchplay is on the rest of the PGA Tour will tackle the Mayakoba Classic. This tournament has been around only a couple of years and there is no real formline out of it. So I’m going for players who are in form. They are Kevin Na, Bill Lunde and John Merrick. Each of these three has been in contention a number of times already this season and it would be no surprise to see one of them win.
The European Tour visits Indonesia this week and the course being used in Bali is a new one for the Indonesian Open so again there’s no history of form, so again I’ll go for current performances.
Adam Blyth is a young Aussie who has been in contention two weeks running at Malaysia (10th) and then at the Johnnie Walker Classic in Perth (7th). He has a lovely, slow-tempo swing and appears unflappable so I think he can contend again.
Another Aussie on the rise is Andrew Dodt who finished 21st at Perth but he has big raps on him and could surprise here.
And Spaniard Ignacio Garrido has been creeping into form over the past few weeks, culminating with a 10th placing in Perth – he can kick on.
Ok, just a quick summary of last week. I admit I didn’t think Mickelson could win at Riviera and in some ways my thinking was right – his tournament was like a roller coaster: 64-72-62-72. And it was only his grittiness down the stretch as he battled a disintegrating swing that got him home.
My best result was Luke Donald’s tie for sixth.
In Perth I was way off the pace and the least said the better about a bad tipping week there.
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