Bo Van Pelt, the value in Bulgaria according to The Punter
The European Tour visits Bulgaria for the very first time this week, where 24 players line-up for the annual match play jamboree. Who does Steve fancy to leave with the Leva?
Tournament History
First staged back in 1964 and won by Arnold Palmer, the Volvo World Match Play Championship is now a very different event to the old autumnal Wentworth treat that many will remember with much fondness. It was oh so easy back then - a collection of the world's best would turn up at Ernie Els' gaff, saunter round Surrey's finest for a few days and then Ernie Els would collect the trophy and all those that followed the most obvious selection in the golfing calendar collected their winnings, halcyon days indeed.
But like many good things in life, it didn't last forever and for reasons best known to others, it was decided that the event required a complete overhaul and now we have a very different format in a different country at a different time of year.
Format
24 players contest over four days. The first half of the tournament, Thursday and Friday, is spent whittling 24 down to 16. I know, I know, surely they'd be better off just having 32 entrants and a straight knockout from the start but no, that's obviously far too simple. Instead the top 16 players have been seeded, and they've been put into eight groups of three, with each group containing one of the eight un-seeded players. Seed one has been paired with seed 16, seed two with seed 15 and so on and so forth. The two seeds in each group play each other on Wednesday afternoon, and then each seeded player takes on the non-seed in their respective groups on Friday. First and second in each group of three then advance to the last-16 and they play on Saturday morning. The quarter-finals are on Saturday afternoon and the semi-finals and final are staged on Sunday morning and Sunday afternoon. All matches are over 18 holes.
Venue
Thracian Cliffs Golf & Beach Resort, Kavarna, Bulgaria
Course Details
Par 72, 7291 yards
Judging by some of the pictures and videos, we're in for a real treat this week. Course designer, Gary Player, declares that, "You will not find a golf course like this anywhere else on the planet" and he may have a point. Nicknamed the Pebble Beach of Europe, the Black Sea is in view on every hole. Please see links below for more details, paying particular attention to the spectacular 6th hole and the unique 7th tee, which sits out to sea!
Useful Sites
Event Site
Tournament Draw
Course Site
Course Map
Twitter Link
Weather Forecast
TV Coverage
Live on Sky all four days, starting at 12.00pm on Thursday
Last Five Winners
2012 - Nicolas Colsaerts
2011 - Ian Poulter
2010 - No event
2009 - Ross Fisher
2008 - No event
2007 - Ernie Els (Staged at Wentworth)
2006 - Paul Casey (Staged at Wentworth)
Is there an identikit winner?
Match play experience is massive at this event, as it is at the WGC World Match Play. Last year's winner, Nicolas Colsaerts, didn't have the richest match play pedigree, although he had reached the last four the year before, and he went on to show victory in this event was no fluke when impressing greatly at the Ryder Cup.
As a rule of thumb, if you're backing someone with no form in this event, the WGC World Match Play or the Ryder Cup, think very carefully before you press the blue back button.
Don't concern yourself with temperament when it comes to weighing up match play wagers. Last year's victor, Colsaerts, gets in his own way in stroke play events and with just one win in well over 200 European Tour starts he's rarely a value proposition in stroke play, but match play is very different. You only have to concern yourself with what your opponent's doing and many a wobbly stroke play exponent has excelled in this format.
In-Play Tactics
There was plenty of value about on Thursday and Friday at last year's event, as there was in 2011, and I'm pretty sure it will be the same this year. Over the last two years, layers didn't seem to fully grasp that losing your first match is far from fatal and both the last two winners traded at very handsome prices in-running.
Ian Poulter, in 2011, like last year's champion, Colsaerts, managed to win the title despite failing to win either of his first two matches. Poults drew both his round-robin matches two years ago and Colsaerts fared even worse twelve months ago. After drawing with Charl Schwartzel on Thursday, he lost to Retief Goosen on Friday morning and spent the afternoon sleeping. A surprise win by the Goose over Schwartzel meant that that the big Belgian needed waking for a sudden-death playoff with Schwartzel, which he duly won.
It's also worth scanning the market while the early matches, in particular, are in progress. I see from last year's notes, that I backed eventual runner-up, Graeme McDowell, at a very decent price, the moment he was guaranteed a place in the next round when Martin Kaymer lost to Richard Finch. It's laborious but it can be worth the effort.
Market Leaders
It's no surprise to see first and second seeds, Graeme McDowell and Ian Poulter, vying for favouritism. G-Mac is a very experienced Ryder Cupper with event form to boot -he lost last year's final to Colsaerts. Having only just won the RBC Heritage in the States he's in better form than Poulter but I prefer the Englishman.
Poulter almost single-handedly won the Ryder Cup last year, is arguably the best match play exponent in the world and is impossible to discount in any match play tournament. I know he's missed his last two cuts and hasn't looked great all year but you can never ever discount him in this format.
The 2007 WGC World Match Play champ, Henrik Stenson, is in fine form (tied 5th at The Players Championship on Sunday) but I'd be a bit worried about the effect a weekend in-contention will have and I'm not mad keen on the defending champ either...
It's never easy to defend a title and those that do so are usually mentally strong, something I'm not convinced the big-hitting Belgian is. Colsaerts was perfectly suited to last year's especially long venue and although he could very well take to this one too, at just 12.011/1, he's definitely not for me.
Selections and Tactics
I fancy the best way to play any knockout event is to pick out a player from each quarter and to aim for the perfect scenario of getting all four semi-finalists onside but I'm going to put a slight twist on that tactic.
I've played just two from the start, one from each side of the draw, and I'm going to try and back a couple more in-running. As detailed above, opportunities often arise during the event and I was able to back both last year's finalists' in-play, at odds of 11.010/1 and 38.037/1.
First up is Ian Poulter, who I simply can't leave out from the start. The price isn't spectacular but Poults' match play record is and if he gets on a roll he could be impossible to stop.
My only other pre-event pick is Bo Van pelt, or as he's often cruelly dubbed, Bo Van Melt. There are pros and cons about the American this week but I fancy the pros outweigh the cons nicely and I thought he was a great price at 23.022/1 - I'll start with the cons...
As his nickname suggests, Bo is far from the greatest in-contention, and given his unquestionably immense talent, it's almost criminal that he's only ever won just one official PGA Tour event but as detailed above, that means diddly-squat in this format.
The other negative is his lack of match play pedigree. He won a few amateur events but he hasn't exactly shone as a pro, having never gotten past the second round in three attempts at the WGC Match Play tournament, but if you dig a little deeper, maybe he's been a little unlucky at that event.
All three opponents to knock him out there, Mark Wilson, Poulter and Matt Kuchar, went on to reach at least the semi-finals so on each occasion, he clearly bumped into a tough adversary.
On the positive side, unusually for an American, Bo clearly likes to travel and is seen in a much better light away from home. He won the Handa Perth International on the European Tour last October and a year earlier, he won the CIMB Asia Pacific Classic in Malaysia, on the Asian Tour.
He's the number four seed here and the 26th best player on the planet, according to the world rankings, and I fancy he's a very fair price at 23.022/1.
Selections:
Ian Poulter @ 9.89/1
Bo Van Pelt @ 23.022/1
I'll be back later today with a preview of the week's PGA Tour event, the HP Byron Nelson Championship and it'll probably be tomorrow before I get to the week's third event, the Madeira Islands Open.
*You can follow me on Twitter @SteveThePunter
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