This week the Alfred Dunhill Links, a classic on the European circuit calendar with a Pro-Am format and played in the three usual venues, the Old course de St. Andrews, Carnoustie and Kingsbarns, with the cut located after the third day, once everyone has played a round in each field, and the final round in the Old course. As we will now review, this appointment is the true nemesis of Spanish golf, a monster with seven heads for ours, an insurmountable obstacle, who knows why … But first we will give an account of other data of great interest.
There are barely five tournaments left on the regular calendar before the Dubai Final and this week’s is especially important, with a purse of five million dollars and 5,500 points to be distributed from the Race to Dubai. In other words: a good performance in Scottish lands can fix the year for more than one, much more in the current pandemic conditions, since there are not many tournaments with such loot of money and points.
You have to think about only one thing: leaving aside the week of the Estrella Damm Andalucía Masters in Valderrama, in which there will also be a juicy bag of three million euros, this week in Scotland it is almost worth the same as the other three meetings that would remain (Spanish Open, Mallorca Golf Open and Portugal Masters). A practical example: if the same player won in Mallorca and finished second in the Spanish Open and in Portugal, which is a lot to assume, he would add 940 points, while this week’s winner in St. Andrews will add 915 points, nor more no less.
We have ten Spaniards there. One of them is Javier Ballesteros, invited by the organization of the tournament, since this week the exciting premiere of a documentary series about his father will take place in St. Andrews. The other nine are still, for example, trying to get into the Dubai Final, since none of them are currently in the top 60 of the Race: Adri Arnaus, Adrian Otaegui, Rafa Cabrera Bello, Alvaro Quiros, Pablo Larrazabal, Nacho Elvira, Santi Tarrío, Jorge Campillo and Alejandro Cañizares. And any of them could rise, at least temporarily, to those first sixty places, with a good result in Scottish lands, within the top ten or, depending on the case, within the top 5. To Álvaro Quirós, for example, that He’s in dire need of points to secure a solid category next year, he could be worth a fifth place to beat that top 125 mark in the Race.
In any case, as we already anticipated, you have to be very careful when speaking or expecting a good performance from a Spanish player in this tournament. Tradition plays against the Navy in these places. And how. In 19 editions, Spanish golf barely gathers three top ten: a fourth place from Rafa Cabrera Bello in 2009, a fifth from Álvaro Quirós in 2010 and the most recent, a tenth place from Nacho Elvira in 2018. Beyond that, there were editions in the that only one Spaniard made the cut, or not even that (in 2017 none of them succeeded) and there have been numerous occasions in which the first Spaniard did not even appear in the top 25.
Few tournaments in the European TourIf nothing else, they show such meager results for our golf. In addition, the matter takes on the dimension of File X if we take into account that in the Dunhill Cup, a tournament that was played by countries (three players made up the team from each country) and the predecessor of the current event, Spain reaped excellent results (without going further away, it was second in 1998 and won in 1999 and 2000, the last two editions). Could it be that, as in the Ryder, it is once again shown that Spanish golf is really into team play?
On the other hand, the ‘pitch’ is destined this week for those who manage to overcome some harsh playing conditions, since it will blow a lot of wind, especially on Friday, accompanied by the classic showers and with temperatures that are not too generous, precisely . Much more in this Pro-Am format, with rounds that sometimes exceed five hours of stay in the field …
It will be necessary to see how it arrives at the appointment Tyrrel Hatton after the Whistling Straits blow, although he had no choice but to hang the favorite tag: he won the tournament in 2016 and 2017, he was second in 2018 and 15th in the last edition disputed, that of 2019.
