Past winners back for more at Coolum
PGA 
/ Nick Tedeschi / 09 December 2009 / Leave a comment Bet Now View Market
At any golf tournament missing Tiger Woods (and maybe Tiger's now lost his mojo along with his reputation) there are a couple of factors to be considered when trying to pick a winner, writes Nick Tedeschi.
"Always tough to pick a winner in a golf tournament, but Allenby has very strong claims and I can see him grabbing the headlines this year."
For a start, it's worth considering previous winners of the tournament, and this week's Australian PGA Championship is a prime example.
If you've won a tournament before, you've shown you can handle both the pressure and in particular the course. However, this week that doesn't present us with too short a list of contenders, as the winners of seven of the past eight PGA Championships are all present at the Hyatt Regency Coolum.
Two in particular have shown their mastery of the event - Peter Senior has won twice, the most recent being six years ago, while Peter Lonard has won three times in the noughties, most recently two years ago.
Other previous winners are Craig Parry, a winner back in 1992, Nick O'Hearn who lifted the trophy in 2006 and defending champion Geoff Ogilvy.
Singh sure to be a hit
The championship course, which has been redesigned and will present something of a new challenge to all, will also see three-time Major champion Vijay Singh look for the honours, while a slimmed-down version of Wild Thing, John Daly, has recovered quicker than expected from a rib problem and will have everyone expecting a monster drive at the first.
The other significant factor in trying to pick a winner is recent form, and in that regard Adam Scott and Stuart Appleby are sure to have their backers.
Scott won the Australian Open by five shots at the weekend, making light of what has been a disappointing year on the USPGA Tour.
And Appleby played outstanding golf for the first two rounds in very difficult conditions. He will be disappointed to have slipped on the final couple of days, but he has the game to win on the Sunshine Coast.
Allenby bang in form
Likewise Robert Allenby is in form, having become the first Australian winner of the Nedbank Challenge in South Africa at the weekend.
This year he has finished tied for second at the Bridgestone Invitational, and has three other top-10 finishes.
Ogilvy struggled at the Australian Open, but the world's no. 14 player has won two tournaments this year and finished in the top 10 five times, winning nearly $4million in prize money.
His wins came in the Mercedes-Benz Championship and the Accenture Match Play Championship, and he will be more than keen to finish his year off in style.
In contrast, Singh has failed to win a tournament this year and only made the top 10 three times, his best a tie for sixth at the Crowne Plaza Invitational.
Those who back him will be doing so with their hearts, perhaps, rather than their heads - his third and last Major came in the PGA Championship five years ago, and his last win anywhere was 15 months ago at the Deutsche Bank Championship.
Campbell unlikely to challenge
There is another Major winner in the field, 2005 US Open champion Michael Campbell of New Zealand, but he will be hard pressed to even finish as the top Kiwi at the event as David Smail - twice a winner on the PGA Tour of Australasia - will likely take that honour.
And what of the chances of the major drawcard, Daly? Twice a Major champion - the 1991 PGA Championship and the Open Championship of 1995 - he has lost 52kg in an effort to turn his life around, but his fortunes on the course have been nothing to write home about.
He has only played six PGA Tour events this year, and made the cut three times, though he did show at the Open Championship where he tied for 27th that he can string a couple of decent rounds together.
Always tough to pick a winner in a golf tournament, but Allenby has very strong claims and I can see him grabbing the headlines this year.
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