Scandinavian Mixed Tips 2022

At 60^th in the OWGR Alex Noren is the worthy favourite this week, even if he does arrive here off the back of two missed cuts. That didn’t seem to be a problem for last year’s contenders though and weekends off at the US PGA Championship and Memorial Tournament came at substantially higher levels than this.

With the US Open looming for the Swede next week though, perhaps his focus will be elsewhere in his homeland having once been a must-back in events leading up to a Major. His 2011 Wales Open win was his last start before the US Open; his 2015 Nordea Masters win also preceded that year’s US Open; 2016 saw him win the Scottish Open the week before The Open itself; and in 2018 he won the Open de France in his last start before that year’s Open too. That’s where the run ends though and perhaps over time he’s got more in the mindset of trying not to peak too early. Or perhaps that’s just a narrative I’m building to justify leaving him alone.

For me, the value lies a little deeper in the field this week with Johannes Veerman catching the eye at around 4-times Noren’s price. The talented American has yet to break into the OWGR top-100 in his career and failed to get going in the recent DP World Tour US Open qualifying race that concluded last week, so he’ll have to content himself with watching the action from his armchair next week. He’s a better player than that though and I don’t think it will be too long before he’s a mainstay in golf’s biggest events and plying his trade back on home soil.

Having just turned 30 in the past fortnight or so, perhaps we’ll see a renewed focus from the Californian. Certainly last week’s 10^th place finish in Germany was a leap forward in his form having missed 5 of his previous 6 cuts, and 7^th for SG Putting was a noteworthy stat as the putter had been a little cold of late. 8^th for GIR last week was his best in-field ranking on that count since January and he seemed buoyed on Social Media with his improvement.

A pair of top-20 finishes in Kenya since 2019, 10^th at Valderrama, 3^rd at Galgorm last year and 8^th at the Italian Open in September all carry some relevance to this week in either course style or agronomy, and this shorter, more strategic setup should be right up his alley. RESULT: T18

After opening with a round of 78 last week in Hamburg, only eventual winner Kalle Samooja and 5^th place finisher Brandon Stone bettered Thriston Lawrence’s final 54-hole total in Germany as he battled back from a near-certain missed cut to finish inside the top 20.

Perhaps that battling performance will see the 25 year-old rekindle some of the early-season form that threatened to quickly add a more conventional DP World Tour title to the 36-hole affair that he triumphed in at the Joburg Open back November, when Omicron fears caused widespread panic, curtailing the event.

2^nd at the short, tree-lined Kenya Open is good form for this week in my view and he followed that up with a pair of top-10 finishes at scoreable parkland tracks with Bentgrass greens at the MyGolfLife Open and Steyn City Championship to give further support to his case here this week.

Since that point he’s been treading water in the main, however the putter notably improved last week, ranking 6^th for Putts per GIR on the week, and his approach play continued its recent upward trajectory with 19^th, 13^th, 15^th and then 11^th for SG Approach recorded on 4 of his last 5 outings. RESULT: MC

Despite two of the four co-leaders heading into the final day in this event last year being women, only Alice Hewson made the frame on Sunday from the top-9 finishers overall. The bookies are taking no chances with some of the leading lights on the LET this year to date, however the player who catches my eye at the prices on offer is Lee-Anne Pace.

5 wins on the LET in 2010 quite rightly earned the South African the player of the year title and she followed that up with 4 further wins at the same level up to 2014, as well as a solitary success State-side at the 2014 Blue Bay LPGA. Impressive stuff and although her wins since have largely come at the lower Sunshine Ladies Tour level, at the age of 41 she’s showing no sign of slowing up having added at least one title to her name every year since 2015.

Her successful defence of her South African Women’s Open title at the start of April was Lee-Anne’s most recent success, however she’s kept her form since that point, racking up finishes of 20^th, 10^th, 14^th and 6^th last week in Italy where she ranked 7^th for both Driving Accuracy and GIR to continue a fine spell of long-game excellence that stretches back to that win in her homeland a couple of months ago.

25^th in this event last year came immediately after travelling back from the US Women’s Open; no such travel implications this year should leave her fresher ahead of the short trip from Italy to Sweden this week. RESULT: WD

Finally, trying to match Scott Hend’s game to certain courses is far from an exact science, however there’s a recurring theme in some of his best efforts that makes him difficult to ignore this week given the price on offer.

Despite being one of the longer hitters on Tour, when the Aussie comes to life most often is in shorter courses that he can bully. 4^th in this event 12 months ago on a course only marginally longer than this week’s test is one indicator, however perhaps of more relevance is his 2014 win at Fanling, home of the Hong Kong Open, A short, classical test that would seem to favour precise operators, Hend’s play-off victory over Angelo Que was his first at this level, adding to the 5 Asian Tour trophies that he’d acquired by that point in his career. His win at Saujana at the 2019 Maybank Championship was on another (palm) tree-lined affair that at 7,135 yards is short for a par 72, and you can add to that 2 play-off defeats at Crans-sur-Sierre in 2016 and 2017 on what’s another fiddly track that plays even shorter than its already sub-7,000 yardage due to the altitude in the Swiss Alps.

The reason there’s pretty much always a decent price available on the 49 year-old is his consistency, or lack thereof. 12 Missed Cuts followed an early-season WD in Abu Dhabi, before he found some form in Holland despite feeling under the weather; sitting in 3^rd place heading into Sunday, a final round 76 saw him slide down to a tie for 14^th in the end. Progress nevertheless, and 25^th for Total Driving that week improved to 3^rd on that count on the Asian Tour last week in a mid-division finish to suggest that his long game may just be in the kind of shape that’s required for him to seriously contend.

6 cuts made from 7 starts in Sweden over the years is uncharacteristically consistent for Hend and with a 4^th place finish at the 2011 Nordea Masters to add to last year’s effort in this format in Gothenburg, a similar finish or better would produce a nice return for each-way backers. RESULT: MC