Nedbank betting preview

By Matt Cooper Last updated: 1st December 2009

Twelve months ago Henrik Stenson ignored his driver on all but two tees and instead used his 3-wood to find the fairways, hit the greens and thrash the field by no less than nine shots at the Nedbank Golf Challenge.

It was an awesome effort that was even better than it first appears - second placed Kenny Perry had to shoot a final round 65 to get within nine of the leader and third placed Robert Karlsson finished 12 strokes adrift of his fellow countryman.

It can often be difficult to get a grip on these silly season elite invitational field events, but the Nedbank does seem to comply to a few trends.

The most obvious is the difficulty debutants have in lifting the trophy - the last to triumph was Zimbabwe's Mark McNulty in 1986.

That counts against five players in this week's field: the promising American pair Nick Watney and Hunter Mahan, England's Ross Fisher, Australian Robert Allenby and the whizzkid Rory McIlroy.

The clover-leaf greens at the Gary Player G&CC in Sun City take some getting used to - as does the clinging Kikuyu grass on the fairways - which goes some way to explaining the difficulties first-timers experience and it is enough to put me off the five.

Prior to last year's renewal Dave Tindall highlighted the fact that winners here tend to arrive in form and Stenson also did so - he and Karlsson won the World Cup the week before they travelled to South Africa.

That form is usually recent form, in events that have taken place since the end of the main European and PGA Tour seasons.

Taking that into account I rule out Luke Donald (37th last time out), Tim Clark (4th on his last outing but it came six weeks ago), and Retief Goosen (16th last time out).

And then there were four.

Richard Sterne finally found a bit of form last week at the World Cup but his efforts on his course have never been too inspirational whilst Angel Cabrera doesn't appeal at 10/1.

So it boils down to the two Swedes - the defending champion and his partner from last week's World Cup in Mission Hills, Robert Karlsson.

Stenson has played here three times finishing second, fourth and first; he played well last week; is unlikely to change his successful 3-wood game plan of last year; and defending champions have a strong record in this event.

Karlsson looked impressive on his debut here and has been second in both of the last two weeks (first at the Dunlop Phoenix and then the World Cup).

He is also attacking silly season with a slightly different perspective to most - because his 2009 season has been ruined by an eye injury, he is desperate for competitive action and has the bit between his teeth when others might be a little less hungry.

I want both players on side and will back them both; effectively taking Sweden to go one better than in the World Cup and finish first.

I'm taking Stenson at 5/1 and Karlsson at 10/1.

Tips:

4pts win Henrik Stenson at 5/1 (General). Defending champs go well here and the layout suits his game plan.

2pts win Robert Karlsson at 10/1 (General). Eager to make-up for the injury lay-off and made good debut in 2008.