The inaugural India Championship joins the DP World Tour this week and it has attracted some major talent with Rory McIlroy, Viktor Hovland, Tommy Fleetwood, Ben Griffin and Shane Lowry looking to win in one of golf’s outposts.
Key Stats/Skill Set Required
- Putting Average
- Strokes Gained: Putting
- Scrambling
- Strokes Gained: Around The Green
- Driving Accuracy
Delhi Golf Club opened in 1951 and was renovated by Peter Thomson in 1977 before Gary
Player’s team undertook another renovation in 2019. It is a tight track bordering on claustrophobic. The key to success on this deck is scrambling well when missing the small green and then draining putts.
Key Correlation Tournaments
- Kenya Open
- Soudal Open
It is impossible to go past Masters winner and 34-time pro victor Rory McIlroy. The Northern Irish superstar found his way back into the winner’s circle at the Irish Open. His profile is tremendous ranking 3rd in Strokes Gained: Putting, 4th in Scrambling, 4th in Strokes Gained: Around The Green and 6th in Putting Average. This is his to lose.
Young South African Jayden Schaper is playing some quality golf of late and is the pick of the pack below the top tier of elite players. Schaper has finished Top 10 in two of his last three stats and they were not low-tier events being the national opens of France and Spain. His Top 7 finishes at the last two Kenya Opens is a good indicator.
Frenchman Adrien Saddier is going as well as anyone on the DP World Tour. He has finished Top 5 in two of his last four starts and his putting that has taken him to such heights will suit him well here. Saddier has finished Top 23 at the last two Kenya Opens while he finished T-13 in Belgium in 2024.
If looking to form on correlation courses as the best guide then Darius Van Driel must be a bet. The Dutchman won the 2024 Magical Kenya and followed it up with a T-2 in the Soudal Open this year. He has made four straight cuts and he is a known traveller. Looks a very good bet.
Youngster Ben Schmidt has done a solid enough job on his first year on the DP World Tour with a couple of things standing out to suggest he is a show here. Schmidt played both Kenya and Soudal and finished Top 28 in both. He also ranks 17th in Putts Per GIR.