The Punter's De-Brief: Match play pedigree key again

Graeme McDowell, in fine form with two wins in three starts

With the BMW PGA Championship starting on Thursday, Steve's attention is already on Surrey's finest but he's found time for a quick re-cap of last week's action. Read his De-Brief here...

Graeme McDowell will pitch-up at Wentworth this week full of confidence after winning his second event in three starts. He came from two down to beat Thongchai Jaidee in yesterday's Volvo World Match Play final, just a couple of weeks after winning the RBC Heritage on the PGA Tour.

Former US Amateur champion, Peter Uihlein, held his nerve well to land the Madeira Islands Open by two strokes over Morten Orum Madsen and Mark Tullo and in the States, Korea's Sang-Moon Bae overhauled Keegan Bradley at the HP Byron Nelson Championship to win his first PGA Tour event.

My Bets
As detailed in the In-Play Blog, it's been a poor week and just about the only positive I can draw from it is that I didn't get any further involved yesterday.

I'm a tiny bit miffed I didn't take on Keegan Bradley at the HP Byron Nelson - he was matched for thousands at just 1.68/13 halfway through Saturday's third round and I was mildly tempted at that stage and with the benefit of hindsight, I should have layed back some of my final in-running wager of the week, on Madsen in Madeira.

It looked for a short while as though a poor week was going to be saved when the young Dane, who I backed on Saturday night at 23.022/1, burst through the field with an almighty charge but then just as redemption looked possible, he messed it all up with a double-bogey at the final hole and that was that.

What have we learnt for next year?
Plenty of punters will claim that both the Accenture World Match Play and the Volvo World Match Play are lotteries - events to avoid, where anyone can win. But in reality, the winners are nearly always well-fancied beforehand and that was again the case this week, with G-Mac obliging for favourite backers.

When it comes to the crunch, match play experience comes through and it really does make sense to concentrate on those that have Ryder Cup and/or Presidents Cup experience in these events.

At the HP Byron Nelson, once again, up with the pace was the place to be. Sang-Moon Bae trailed Bradley by six strokes after day one but by halfway he'd halved that deficit and was sitting in a tie for second.

When Keegan Bradley won here two years ago, he beat halfway leader, Ryan Palmer, in a playoff, having trailed by five strokes through 36 holes, but other than that result and Bae's win from three-back this year, every winner since 2000 has been within two of the lead at halfway. TPC Four Seasons is not a catch-up course.

I'd written in the Madeira Islands Open preview, about a link between Santo da Serra and Club de Campo and it was interesting to see Rhys Davies, who had finished second to Luke Donald at Club de Campo in 2010, put in his best performance in a very long while this week, to finish 5th.

It was a frustrating week for me in Madeira as I only backed three outsiders from the off, who all missed the cut, but had I played more, I may well have been able to trade myself to a decent profit. Craig Lee, who finished 4th, and runner-up Madsen were on my shortlist, as was Davies - although the Welshman was never actually in the hunt.

Lee had been one of my picks at the Africa Open and I fancy form at East London, home of the Africa Open, may well be worth looking at for Madeira and vice versa. They're both coastal wind-affected undulating tracks and a couple of players have played well at both venues this year. John Parry finished inside the top-20 at both events and Tullo really franked the form. This week's runner-up in Madeira finished tied 5th at the Africa Open back in February.

We've got one of my favourite events of the year this week with the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth starting on Thursday. And the Crowne Plaza Invitational in the States is a decent tournament too. I'll be back tomorrow with a preview for each event.