The European Tour travels to Malaysia this week as the Fantasy Race To Dubai enters its fourth week. Our stats gurus have crunched all the key numbers and hand selected these five players as the ones to watch this week…
Arguably the most in-form player on The European Tour at the moment, Wiesberger was the only player to finish inside the top six at each Desert Swing event and the big Austrian has nine top 16 finishes over his last 12 events. He finished tied second here in Malaysia last year and has broken par at Kuala Lumpur G&CC in seven of his last eight rounds. Watch this space.
The smiling Englishman has plenty of reasons to smile heading into this week. Having picked up his first European Tour win at the South African Open four weeks ago, he followed it up with a top twenty finish in Qatar and top five in Dubai last week. He made his Malaysian Open debut last year and found himself in the final group on Sunday where a disappointing 78 saw him finish 13th. With an improved game and improved confidence, he is certainly one to watch this week.
The Maybank Malaysian Open has favoured long hitters in recent years and there are few longer than Belgium’s Colsaerts. With three par fives under 540 yards and three par fours under 360 yards, Colsaerts will be eager to pick up his first stroke play win since the 2011 Volvo China Open. His form has drastically improved in recent months, evident by his 69.2 scoring average since the start of September. Along with Wiesberger, the 32 year old finished runner-up here last season and has finished inside the top 35 in each of the last four years.
There is a lot of excitement around French golf at the moment with the recent successes of Gary Stal, Alexander Levy and Victor Dubuisson. One Gallic name perhaps being somewhat overlooked currently, though, is Monsieur Bourdy. The 32 year old is 28 under par for his last eight rounds on Tour and ranks inside the top 20 in both Driving Accuracy and Greens in Regulation this season. He finished runner-up to Matteo Manassero here in Malaysia back in 2011 and has finished in the top 20 in both the past two years so evidently revels in the tropical conditions of south-east Asia.
Few players have more experience at this event than Thai veteran Jaidee. He is the only two-time champion at the Malaysian Open and this will be his 16th consecutive appearance. Along with his two wins, the 45 year old has a further three top seven finishes and is 104 under par at this tournament over the course of his glittering career. The six-time European Tour winner has not missed a cut in his last 13 events and has five rounds in the 60s in his last eight rounds.
So concludes our Fantasy Five To Watch for this week, but was it enough to sway your team selection? Pick your team over at theFantasy Race To Dubai homepage.
