The European Tour returns to South Africa for the third time this season at the 2017 Joburg Open. The tournament was played in January the past few years and now gets a new date and because of it, the betting field is lackluster at best with no star power and really no depth. The 210 player field is the largest of the year.
Defending champion Haydn Porteous +7250 returns and is joined by fellow South Africans Branden Stone +1000, George Coetzee +1400, Thomas Aiken +1900, Jaco Van Zyl +1200 and Dean Burmester +2400.
Flourishing rookies Thomas Detry +2550 and Jordan Smith +1800 also are in the field. European Tour winners Hao Tong Li +2000 and Soomin Lee +7000 are also scheduled to compete.
None of the top South African players showed up this week. Charl Schwartzel, Louis Oosthuizen and Branden Grace decided to skip the event which was not good for the tournament.
The Courses: This week two courses will be used, similar to the tournament in San Diego on the PGA Tour. The East course at Royal Johannesburg and Kensington Country Club will be used three rounds and it has staged all nine previous South African Opens. The layout is long measuring close to 7,700 yards and plays to a par 72. The high altitude will make the course play much shorter than the yardage.The West course will be used the first two days of competition and it is by far the easier course. It is much shorter measuring 7,200 yards and offers plenty of birdie opportunities. Both tracks feature tree-lined kikuyu fairways and have Bent and Poa greens.
Joburg Open Golf Odds courtesy of BookMaker.eu:
Brandon Stone +1000
Jaco Van Zyl +1200
George Coetzee +1400
Richard Sterne +1600
Jordan Smith +1800
Thomas Aiken +1900
Hao Tong Li +2000
Anthony Wall +2200
Dean Burmester +2400
Thomas Detry +2550
Alexander Bjork +2750
Romain Langasque +3000
Ryan Fox +3250
Christiaan Bezuidenhout +3500
Dylan Frittelli +3750
Jacques Blaauw +4000
James Morrison +4400
Justin Hicks +4500
Maximilian Kieffer +5000
Chris Hanson +5250
Chris Paisley +5500
Graeme Storm +5750
Paul Dunne +6000
Ricardo Gouveia +6050
Marc Warren +6500
Renato Paratore +6600
Soomin Lee +7000
Haydn Porteous +7250
Jason Walters +7500
Jamie Donaldson +8500
Paul Peterson +9000
Robert Rock +9500
Jbe Kruger +10000
Zander Lombard +11000
Daniel Im +12500
Tom Lewis +12500
FIELD - Any Other Player +500
TV Coverage: The Golf Channel
ODDS ANALYSIS
Richard Sterne +1600 will be attempting to make history by becoming the only player to win this event three times. Four of his six European Tour wins have come on home soil, including his last four.
The last time rookie Thomas Detry +2550 played in South Africa, he secured a third place finish at the Alfred Dunhill Championship for his career best finish in his first year on tour. The Belgian youngster via the University of Illinois has the game and is primed to pick up a win sooner rather than later.
FADE: Haydn Porteous +7250 shocked the world last year by picking up his first win on the European Tour, BUT since has played poorly. He played bad after the win and opened up this year with four missed cuts, before finally getting on the board with a T26 in his last start in Malaysia.
BookMaker.eu offers play-by-play betting odds for live sporting events every day! The user-friendly wagering interface on your smartphone provides an easy way to place bets on the go.The Joburg Open is scheduled for February 23-26, 2017. The Golf Channel will televise it live.
