The title to decide who ends the Challenge Tour season as the Number One graduate looks to be a straight shoot-out between the English duo of Tommy Fleetwood and Sam Little, but two of their compatriots also have designs on succeeding the 2010 Rankings winner Alvaro Velasco of Spain.
Like Little and Fleetwood, who currently occupy the top two places in the Challenge Tour Rankings, both Danny Denison and Jamie Moul – respectively fourth and sixth in the Rankings – have also won this season.
Denison and Moul, respective winners of the ECCO Tour Championship presented by Thomas Björn & Mercedes-Benz and the Acaya Open, could be poised to strike should either of their compatriots come unstuck at next week’s Apulia San Domenico Grand Final, held at San Domenico Golf in Puglia, southern Italy.
Fleetwood believes the abundance of Englishmen at the top of the Rankings is a credit to the English Golf Union (EGU), which provides coaching, support and advice for young English players as they bid to make their way in the game and step up from the amateur to the professional ranks.
The EGU has also recently become a partner to the Challenge Tour, having supported the English Challenge at Stoke-by-Nayland last July.
They invested in the tournament, which was the first Challenge Tour event to be played on English soil since the Oceânico Group Pro-Am Challenge in June 2008 and was won by Benjamin Hebert, in order to ease the transition from the elite amateur to the professional ranks.
It was the tournament where Fleetwood made his first marks on the professional stage, coming second there as an amateur in 2010.
Fleetwood said: “I think the fact that when you look at the Challenge Tour Rankings and see Jamie, Danny and myself in the top ten, it just goes to show you how well the EGU are doing in developing the young players that come through their system.
“It shows that there are more players coming through all the time. English players have been at the top of the World Rankings for most of the season with first Lee [Westwood] and then Luke [Donald], but there are now good players coming through at all levels and all ages, so the EGU should be given a lot of credit for that.”
If the EGU has laid the groundwork for Fleetwood’s meteoric rise through the professional ranks, the Challenge Tour has provided the perfect finishing school – as the man himself acknowledges.
He said: “I have to say that the Challenge Tour is great way to learn about the professional game. It sounds silly to some people, but I wouldn’t have chosen and other way to get my card for the main Tour. Spending a year on the Challenge Tour has made me a better player, and shown me what it’s like to be a touring pro. I’m so happy that I have taken this route, because it has toughened me up a fair bit.”
