With Valderrama on the schedule in three weeks' time, the tour showcases a trio of its best courses within a month, and whilst deserving of a. MEN'S FRENCH OPEN ODDS · Carlos Alcaraz + · Novak Djokovic + · Jannik Sinner + · Rafael Nadal + · Casper Ruud + · Stefanos. Cazoo Open de France betting tips · Min Woo Lee @ 11/1 with William Hill · Aaron Rai @ 14/1 french open golf betting preview William Hill · Victor Perez @ 35/1 each way with. Open de France Tips · pts Thorbjorn Olesen each way (1/5 – 6 places) – 33/1 · pts Antoine Rozner each way (1/5 – 8 places) – 35/1 · 1.
Olesen's debut second came behind Thomas Levet but while French golf has come a long way since, unearthing a genuine star has been difficult. Victor Perez leads the way currently ahead of Antoine Rozner, both of them in the field, but for reasons unclear at the time of writing Romain Langasque has withdrawn to weaken the home challenge.
French-speaking Colsaerts was of course a popular winner from next door in Belgium but since Levet's triumph only Victor Dubuisson has ended any round at the top of the leaderboard and while both Rozner and Perez made some appeal, if we do see the tricolore on top perhaps it'll be Adrien Saddier, one to watch in markets like first-round leader. The trouble with that is Thursday's forecast is not good and I'll therefore stick to trying to find the champion, with YANNIK PAUL one of those capable of shaking up the favourites for all that he too has been doing his best work on day one of late.
Paul certainly was in the Ryder Cup running and made a gallant bid to qualify, featuring early on in Prague and then at Crans, where he finished 10th and 20th when he needed more. No wonder he dipped a little over the following fortnight, both he and Adrian Meronk unable to produce a defiant display following their respective disappointments.
Paul though has continued to pound greens, ranking 15th, eighth, second and seventh across his four post-Open starts, and he's gaining strokes both off the tee and with those approaches. The simple difference between two good efforts and two mediocre ones was his short-game, which like most comes and goes. Hitting quality approaches is really the key to this course, one that can't be overpowered even when it does play soft.
Avoiding water that guards holes like the first, second, 16th and 18th and generally limiting mistakes is the formula, although it must be said that hitting par-five greens in two is hard and his chipping will need to step up in order to collect those cheap birdies. In fairness to Paul his season-long short-game stats are very good and as the second-ranked iron player in the field, this looks just as good a course fit as last year's debut eighth suggests it should be.
The worry might be that he's heading out for a fifth week in succession and in general that's a concern for some of the DP World Tour regulars, especially as most of the market leaders are much fresher. However, Paul's Mallorca win was in his sixth consecutive start and three runner-up finishes this year also came towards the end of a busy run.
He's currently the player occupying the final spot on the list of players who will earn PGA Tour membership via the Race to Dubai and having been in a similar position all summer on the Ryder Cup points list, perhaps he can put that experience to use. Alex Bjork heads that strokes-gained approach table and his chance is obvious, the Swede having played well on every visit to Paris.
Another Ryder Cup hopeful who gave it a really good go, particularly when second for us in Switzerland, he bounced back from a missed cut at the K Club with a decent effort at Wentworth and is respected. Although it took Otaegui a little while to figure this place out, he's gone MC over his last four visits, leading the field in fairways and ranking third in greens last year.
It's an ideal course for the DP World Tour leader in fairways, who showed what he's all about with a runaway win at Valderrama last year. Since then, the one thing preventing Otaegui from also featuring in the Ryder Cup conversation has been his putter. Once one of the more reliable clubs in his bag, he's become very shaky over short ones in particular and I have to confess that remains a concern, having ranked 66th, 71st and 85th in putting from Prague to Ireland.
More of that and he won't be winning this, but a previous fourth at Galgorm Castle, when he putted to a decent standard, tells you plenty. Otaegui is going to be a massive runner at this sort of level whenever a good putting week does come along and, crucially, there were good signs at Wentworth where he beat the field average.
Second place in the KLM Open back in May came after he'd shown putting improvement in the PGA Championship and we know he has it in him, having leaned on his putter during that Valderrama romp little under a year ago. This is similar challenge albeit on a longer, more exposed course, where conditions should suit one of the straightest shooters on the circuit.
Kimsey has had the best summer of his career, losing a play-off to Vincent Norrman in the Barbasol and returning home to play well most weeks, including at Wentworth where he was rewarded by playing with Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton on Sunday. I'm not surprised he struggled a little in that scenario but as the dust settles he'll surely draw plenty of encouragement from how he performed in the BMW PGA Championship, which sets him up perfectly for a course that should suit him down to the ground.
Kimsey has played here once before, finishing 38th during his rookie season in It was one of his best performances all year despite a poor weekend, Kimsey having sat second after an opening 66 and then fifth at halfway. French open golf betting preview Gordon Sargent has St. Andrews caddie Alan Tulleth on his bag. His other encouraging displays during a generally poor campaign also came on courses where you might expect one so accurate to thrive, most notably in India, but the form line I really like is his victory in the Vaudreuil Golf Challenge last summer, which paved the way for his return to this level.
Aside from the latter, all are players who pride themselves on accuracy and so is Aaron Rai, another former champion there who tells you what that test is all about. Kimsey's win at that course underlines why he's so well suited to this one and he arrives on the back of that top at Wentworth, where his approach play was outstanding and his usually reliable short-game let him down for once.
It's an ideal platform providing he's got more left in the tank, which he should have. We are now at the time of year when the rank-and-file have all sorts of things to start worrying about or focusing on, with just five more full-field events to go for the season. Fabrizio Zanotti is the final man in when it comes to cards for as things stand and the veteran Paraguayan has a good record here, making seven cuts in succession.
Anyone who does that is seriously comfortable at a course which makes others feel anything but, yet his persistent putting woes are difficult to overlook. Ramsay is just one good week away from a return to Dubai at the end of the year and you sense he knows it, having been frustrated not to build on a fast start last week and generally displeased with how three post-Open starts have gone.
The Scot is feeling better about things however and wrote that his 'game is trending' despite a sloppy finish at Wentworth. Certainly he has the 18th hole to blame for not finishing higher than 28th, having played it in two-over. He'd been eight-under, one off the lead, when finishing on Friday so it was a what-might-have-been week.
Played really well today bar one shot but worsed score. Fantastic tournament. Game is trending but mid table does nothing for u, need more high finishes. Still, there are lots of positives in his game at the moment and he's a bit fresher than most having played just three times since the Open, quickly slipping back into his fairways-first game and taking a big step forward with his approach work at Wentworth.
There's still some improvement needed but Ramsay once listed Le Golf National as one of his three favourite courses on the circuit, that before declaring in that the course had become more difficult for him in soft, autumn conditions. Fifth that year as he had been when contending in , a peak-form Ramsay has what it takes to go really close and having been denied the chance to defend at Hillside, he might see this as one of his best opportunities this side of the season finale.
Kristian Krogh Johannessen was first reserve last week and doubtless really disappointed not to get another crack at Wentworth, where he'd played so well a year earlier. Although his performance was disappointing, the overall balance of his form this year merits shorter prices and I can't help but feel he's been easy to back on the assumption that a withdrawal must mean something physical, which in this instance isn't the case.
Perhaps it's more the way he played but prior to it Southgate had been 23rd in Ireland, the same position he filled at the Open, while ninth at Galgorm Castle and 10th in Denmark add to what's been a really solid year. In terms of long-game he's more than capable of competing with anyone here, as a well above-average driver who is longer and straighter than most. His approach play has been consistently excellent, ranking ninth for the season, and that all adds up to a top ranking in strokes-gained ball-striking.
So precise is his iron play that he gets up and down a lot, ranking 22nd in scrambling despite chipping never having been his favourite part of the game, and there have been enough good signs with his putting lately. A little like Otaegui, if he putts well he's not likely to be far away.
The course is also a good one for him. Southgate came closest at Green Eagle, an unrelenting test of precision that is similar to Le Golf National, and he's been 11th and fifth here in the past. Both performances were powered by that trademark accuracy and based on the last few months, rather than the last few days, he's in the right sort of place to contend.
Southgate is preferred to Callum Shinkwin, a serious talent and now proven winner who was back to form last week, but whose driver might not be such a weapon in Paris. Whatever Thursday's forecast brings, a generally bright and sunny week otherwise ought to ensure accuracy remains key to this very particular course.
As others like Taylor Pendrith and Cam Davis upped their games on the PGA Tour, Fox perhaps paid the price for a gruelling first six months and wasn't a factor when the world was watching, either in the Scottish Open or the Open that followed. Still, he did fight hard to make the cut in the former and only just missed out on a weekend tee-time in the latter, so I wouldn't be sure that the golden touch has deserted him.
More likely is that he just ran out of steam a little, returning to go MC when under pressure and playing at courses which wouldn't necessarily suit. Le Golf National does, as he showed when 18th on debut and when sixth, leading after the first round, three years ago. That was the first renewal to be played in October and the course was softer as a result, but the firmer conditions expected this week won't be a problem for a player with a fine record under such conditions.
Twice inside the top six in greens hit at the course, it's one he can plot his way round as fellow big-hitter Colsaerts did, so we come back to the state of his game and his position in the market. For my money, two poor putting weeks at Crans and Wentworth have no real bearing on the former, but they've certainly had a bearing on the latter.
Fox probably explained it best himself, when speaking to John Huggan about his omission from Trevor Immelman's team. There was some rust involved there, too, though. But this year I do have some extra motivation. It's pretty clear that he was hopeful rather than expectant at Wentworth, where he withdrew after Friday's second round was cancelled editor's note: this was due to injury which had not been factored into preview , so this is a far better chance to show Immelman what he's missing, something that surely helped drive Lucas Herbert to a big performance in Italy.
That sense of additional motivation combined with his clear preference for Le Golf National makes for a compelling candidate, one who all but deserves more silverware to make up for his misfortune, and Fox can go out and prove his point. Course form tends to hold up well here, even in the case of shock winner Colsaerts. McDowell won his two titles back-to-back, Jaidee had been second and 10th before getting it done in , and Noren also won following successive top finishes.
It's also striking how classy a list it is and that all were previous winners, the last man to secure his first victory here being qualifier Pablo Larrazabal back in Le Golf National isn't necessarily complex in that for the most part the decision is made by the course on behalf of the player, but it requires real nerve and isn't necessarily a place where one would expect rookies or maidens to fend off those with a little more nous.
For now it could catch out the Hojgaard twins and Thorbjorn Olesen might lead the Danish challenge, at a course where his own record is patchy but includes two near-misses plus a fine end to his sole Ryder Cup appearance. He was sorely tempting having won again this year but there's no doubt he was at the very top of his game ahead of both the and renewals, and I don't think the course is as good a fit as it might seem.
Sullivan demonstrated how valuable experience can be with a missed cut on debut, but since then has never failed to play well here, with finishes of Sixth in and then firmly in the mix in both and , he also started well here in and across the first three of these ranked third, sixth and seventh in greens hit, and third, fifth and third in ball-striking.
Time and again he's arrived here and produced some of his best golf and it's no wonder he called it 'one of my favourite weeks of the year' on his penultimate visit. Perhaps 23rd place in tells us as much as his stronger efforts in earlier years as he arrived in dismal form yet still found something, and he's certainly one who will be glad to see the event return. Only recently has Sullivan climbed inside the cut off for tour membership and this presents an ideal chance to really push towards the DP World Tour Championship, a tournament he's almost won and dearly loves.
Sullivan as big an eye-catcher as you'll see lately. He has very much continued in the same vein at Wentworth: five approaches inside 10ft, another few inside 15ft, through 16 holes. Still a tall order to win this week but not impossible, and chances sure to follow soon if not. The reason for his move up the Race to Dubai these last two months is that his ball-striking has turned a corner.
Sullivan has driven it consistently well for a long time now, only losing strokes at the quirky Crans recently, and his iron play has been similarly excellent: first in Denmark, ninth in Wales, and among the best around since the Open. Only a poor putting week kept him from having a good chance to win the Made in HimmerLand, just as it did Robert MacIntyre, and he's since kept moving forward with solid efforts at Wentworth and in Italy.
This now represents a drop in grade and a return to a course we know he enjoys, with Marco Simone not necessarily in that category MC last year and certainly playing longer than he'd like. This four-time DP World Tour winner looks very close to piecing everything together and can do so at a course which properly rewards his accuracy off the tee, which is key to his success when firing on all cylinders.
One of the straightest drivers on the circuit, the Spaniard is another who has contended here in the past, leading at halfway in seventh and sitting within sight of the leaders a year later 12th. Australian open golf betting preview Both of these were far stronger renewals and so was that of , when he sat second after round one.
Three times a winner and always in Europe, including over the border in Belgium, the year-old knows how to get the job done and has been hinting at winning again all year, with four top-fives from his 18 starts on this circuit, and zero missed cuts since May albeit he's played a couple of events without one.
It's no surprise then that he's eighth among this field in strokes-gained total and we might just see even more from him if the LIV Golf experiment is in the past. Otaegui didn't feature in Chicago last week and isn't a player Greg Norman and co are invested in for the long run, which perhaps explains why he was in Italy instead.
Finishing 25th on a course which favoured power over precision was a good effort and while his long-game stats don't leap off the page, that's in no small part down to the nature of the layout. What's more, during Sunday's back-nine he peppered virtually every flag, six birdies in his final seven holes coming without a putt of real note.
Given that he's one of the most accurate players here and is outstanding around the green, and that he's putted well for most of the season, more of that flag-hunting approach work should make him a formidable proposition around a style of course much more suited to his game. He's been in the mix in two of his last four starts and his only real blemish of late came on Thursday in Rome, when he was certainly hurt by an early tee-time and being on the wrong side of a three-shot draw bias.
Like Otaegui, he was hurt by the draw at Marco Simone, a course which I don't think is for him, so a missed cut while doing nothing terribly isn't a worry. Indeed, I return to the simple reason for supporting him in Switzerland, where he finished 23rd when putting poorly: how well he's played at courses we know he likes throughout the season.
Kinhult's four best tee-to-green displays and indeed his four best finishes so far in have come at Doha, in Kenya, at Hillside and at Crans. Those are places where he's either contended or, as is the case at Hillside, won in the past. That he's even managed to punch above his weight at places like Albatross, home of the Czech Masters and a course where power is king, tells me he's back close to his best.
Congratulations marcuskinhult. Winning your first European Tour title in style. BetfredBritishMasters pic. That was certainly the case when leading the field in strokes-gained tee-to-green in the Cazoo Classic where he'd have won with anything like a decent putting week, and the neat-and-tidy Swede now returns to another course which complements his skills, rather than rendering him a little toothless.
Fifth and 11th in two starts here, including when leading a strong renewal which could have put him into the Ryder Cup conversation had he won, Kinhult's record at the course is very strong and he led the all-around ranking back in , when fifth in accuracy and ball-striking and gaining strokes with his long-game.
At times an electric putter who is often razor-sharp around the greens, if he can spend his week playing from the fairway then he can force his way into the mix. Once there, the way he handled himself when winning the British Masters, and a back-catalogue of high-class amateur form, would make him a threat to all. Given all that's been discussed about the nature of this course, the fact that distance counts for little and danger lurks everywhere, it makes sense that we've seen some older champions down the years.
Jaidee won it at 46, Thomas Levet at 42, Miguel Angel Jimenez at 45 and Jean-Francois Remesy at 40, and we've had some more experienced players win on the other short played courses lately, namely Richie Ramsay and Oli Wilson. I had considered Soren Kjeldsen as a result, as his iron play has been excellent and three tops here down the years confirm that he likes the course and has done since a closing 64 on his debut back in However, he continues to putt poorly and has done all year, which makes it particularly difficult to envisage a surprise win to go with that he managed in the Irish Open back in Of the French contingent, Mike Lorenzo Vera has similar credentials and he did well to defy a nightmare start from a bad tee-time in Italy.
However, it's closing on two years since his last top finish, he remains a maiden, and he too has lost his magic touch on the greens. Without it, what would be an emotional breakthrough may have to wait. Morrison has done really well to keep his head above water on the DP World Tour, winning twice in a long career despite battling Crohn's disease throughout it.
It's a real testament to his character and ability to squeeze everything out of his game that he's only lost his card once since , and got it back immediately at Qualifying School. Thanks to another solid season he'll be back for more in but it could get better yet, as he's been playing nicely of late.
Anyone who shoots rounds of 62 and 64, as he has among his last three outings, is clearly doing a lot right and throughout each of them he's been inside the top 20 at halfway before fading. A closing 75 at Wentworth last time will have been enormously disappointing in an event he holds dear but again, the fact that he was 11th with a round to go suggests he's really close and I like that his success — which stretches back to 13th place in Ireland, 36th in world-class company in Scotland and a good effort in the Barracuda — hasn't depended entirely on that short-game of his.
Indeed it's what let him down at Wentworth and kept him on the periphery in Denmark, yet we know what damage he can do with putter in particular. Among his peers, Morrison is considered one of the very best chippers and putters on the circuit and as long as he's ticking over with his long-game, those low numbers are always on the horizon. Both wins came on the continent at exposed courses, a description which very much covers Le Golf National, and this is one of his favourite places to visit.
He led at halfway and through 54 holes back then, eventually finishing seventh, and was unfortunate to bump into Wiesberger in The pair played alongside each other in the penultimate group that day, Wiesberger's 65 trumping Morrison's 67 as they engaged in a private battle down the home stretch.