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18-Hole Match Picks - European Tour |
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4-3; +0.20pts (system plays: 0-1-0) Round 1 plays (2pts unless stated): Danny Willett to beat Paul Casey +100 @ Paddy Power [4pts] LOST by 2 Backing Willett after he returned to the Tour last week after a two-month break due to a back problem and a wedding - he finished 32nd to finish ahead of Casey who missed the cut. With Casey missing four of his last seven cuts, I'll certainly back Willett to beat him again. Danny Willett to beat Ricardo Santos +100 @ William Hill LOST by 8 Santos has been in better form than Casey, but he is also making his debut on this course. Given that there are five par-3s and they have been crucial to the leaders in the last three years on this course, I'll oppose Santos whose length off the tee is the key part of his game. Over the last 12 months, Willett is 3-over-par for par-3s on the European Tour, Santos is 16-over-par (they have both played 61 par-3s over that period). Richard Bland to beat Maximilian Kieffer -110 @ Stan James LOST by 1 Opposing Kieffer who lost a marathon playoff for the Open de Espana last month, but has missed both cuts since then; Bland has finished 5th and 19th in his last two starts, plus he in the midst of contention for three rounds last year until a final round 76 saw him drop from 4th to 22nd; Kieffer is making his course debut. [unofficial rd1 system play: Grillo tb Santos -111 (L)] Round 2 plays (2pts): Joost Luiten to beat Ricardo Santos -120 @ Bet365 WON by 9 Impressed with Luiten today. Not only did he rank 20th for driving distance and 10th in greens in regulation, but he also 1st for greens in regulation and 1st for scrambling. It only takes a slightly warmer putter tomorrow for him to improve on his current 8th place position. Francesco Molinari to beat Alexander Noren +100 @ Bet365 [also available @ 5Dimes and Stan James] WON by 2 Noren is ahead of Luiten on the leaderboard, but was the opposite to him on the course with a hot putter and cold irons and woods. He did win on this course two years ago, but Molinari has shown particularly good form in the last two weeks and dominates this matchup: he leads Noren 16-5-1 h2h since the start of 2012. Mark Foster to beat Magnus A. Carlsson +120 @ 5Dimes [also available @ Stan James] WON by 3 Will bite on these odds to back Foster. He collapsed spectacularly when taking the lead last week, but he is nowhere near the lead this week and I expect him to bounce back tomorrow. No round 3 plays. Round 4 play (2pts): Matteo Manassero to beat Alexander Noren -110 @ Paddy Power WON by 2 Two players in the top-3 with a round to play, both for the fourth time in the past eight months: Manassero converted two of these three recent opportunities, shooting 69-68-69 in the final round; Noren failed to convert any of those three opportunities, shooting 69-71-74. With Manassero shooting the lower final round score than his opponent in all common events in the last six months, these are more than fair odds on Manassero to do the same again.
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