After Alvaro Quiros provided us with a 100/1 winner in Sicily last week, attention turns to one of the European Tour’s flagship events, the BMW PGA Championship.
The West Course at Wentworth hosts the tournament for the 34th year in succession, but has undergone significant changes since Chris Wood’s victory 12 months ago.
All 18 greens were stripped of their old turf and reseeded with a new type of grass, with the greens on the eighth, 11th, 14th and 16th completely rebuilt and another five – the third, fourth, fifth, 12th and 15th – partially rebuilt.
A sub-air system, as used at Augusta National, was also installed, while all of the bunkers were redesigned and a total of 29 removed.
That should lead to lower scoring – Wood’s winning total was just nine under – but quality ball-striking remains essential and that is why England’s Tommy Fleetwood is the first of our BMW PGA Championship betting tips at 28/1.
Fleetwood has been in brilliant form this season, with a victory in Abu Dhabi and runners-up finishes in the WGC-Mexico Championship and Shenzhen International helping him to a career-high rating of 28th in the world.
The 26-year-old is ranked 13th in driving accuracy and second in greens in regulation and although he missed the cut here last year, his sixth place in 2015 included a superb third round of 65.
Given such statistics it is somewhat surprising that Fleetwood is available at a bigger price than Martin Kaymer, but the former world number one still merits our support at 25/1, given his consistent record at Wentworth.
Kaymer was in contention 12 months ago before fading over the closing stretch to finish seventh, his sixth top-20 finish in his last nine appearances in the event.
He has not missed a cut all season and, according to his caddie, is a big fan of the changes to the course.
In contrast, Sweden’s Rikard Karlberg has played at Wentworth just once, but that produced a runner-up finish last year after a closing 65 which included a hole-in-one.
Karlberg, who beat Kaymer in a play-off in the 2015 Italian Open to win his sole European Tour title to date, missed the cut in Sicily last week by a single shot, but was four under par in doing so and is worth a small bet at odds of 100/1.
The same goes for our final selection of Spain’s Jorge Campillo, who was 15th here last year and ninth on his last start in China. Campillo can be backed at 100/1 in the outright market, or 10/1 for a top-10 finish.
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