The Sporting Day: The Australian PGA Championship

Coolum, on the Sunshine Coast, will play host to the 2007 Australian PGA Championship. The tournament is generally regarded as one of Australia’s most prestigious, along with the Australian Open and MasterCard Masters, and is certainly one of the most entertaining. While this is the sixth year at the famed Coolum course for the Australian PGA Championship, the tournament dates back to 1905. Its history is rich and its reputation high.

The honour roll for the Australian PGA Championship is star studded and reads like a list of Australian golfing greats, a veritable line of the pioneers and princes of the Australian golf scene for over a century. Dan Soutar was the king in the infant days of the PGA, winning four of the first six. Between the wars it was Tom Howard and Sam Richardson. The iconic Norman Von Nida, the first true Australian golfing legend, took four of the first six post-World War II PGA Championship’s and would have won more had the war not stolen his peak years. Kel Nagle won the first of his six during the Von Nida run, taking his last nineteen years after his first. British Open hero Peter Thompson could win only one Australian PGA Championship. Bill Dunk won five. The incomparable Greg Norman went back-to-back in 1984-85 but has been unable to win since. Two of Australia’s most popular players, Craig Parry and Peter Senior, have both held the Joe Kirkwood Cup aloft. Robert Allenby has won thrice this decade while Peter Lonard has taken the Championship twice.

And, of course, many international greats have won the Australian PGA. Gary Player. Hale Irwin. Seve Ballesteros. David Howell.

The favourite for the 2007 edition of the Australian PGA Championship is Adam Scott, a justifiable top pick by the books. $10 is being bet about the world number six. Scott has had a good season and will be well suited to the Coolum resort course as it is very similar to the Florida courses he has played so well on. Coolum is a course for good ball strikers, contrived in nature, with plenty of water and eye-catching traps. The only mark against Scott is his failure to have ever taken victory in his homeland. He has a poor record in Australia and despite having won three times on the PGA Tour this season, his failure to have won a major tournament in Australia. His price is probably correct.

With the PGA being played at a single course in recent times, the Australian PGA has taken on a U.S Masters feel with the same names up the top of the leaderboard year after year. That throws Peter Lonard ($15) and 2006 champion Nick O’Hern ($19) right into the mix. Lonard has struck form (as he tends to this time of year) with a quality fifth in the MasterCard Masters while O’Hern has been fairly consistent of late, his last placing being in the Travelers Championship mid-year. Fellow former champions Jarrod Moseley ($151) and Peter Senior ($81) also seem a touch of value and can certainly make a run at the title.

The unknown factor is certainly international visitor Rory Sabbatini. The outspoken South African, number eleven in the world, is on the second line of betting at $13 and must be considered a real threat on recent form, having finished in the top ten at seven of his last eight outings. He is without doubt the best top five bet in the tournament.

One more to consider is Brett Rumford. Rumford is currently $51 and looks value after his dominant performance in the most recent Q School tournament, where he shot twenty-three under.

The Australian PGA Championship starts Thursday morning.

© 2007 Punting Ace.com