While watching last week's Joburg Open, it occurred to me that we might be somewhat between generations in terms of South African golf. This wonderful golfing nation keeps on punching above its weight, each year bringing us new names to learn, new futures to forecast, but in terms of successors to the major winners of a decade ago, we're still on the lookout.
The sport as it is now will make it difficult for Christiaan Bezuidenhout to follow in the footsteps of those who came before him, and Brandon Stone's search for the sort of form which saw him reach 67th in the world goes on. His friend Haydn Porteous, who burst on the scene at around the same time, is utterly lost, and we're days away from there being no South African player among the world's top 50.
LIV Golf's emergence has played a part of course and rankings do not always reflect ability, but if Dean Burmester wins the South African Open, he will be the highest-ranked player from the Rainbow Nation. With great respect to another fine player, one who's a late-bloomer at 33, that says a lot. So does the fact that as a new PGA Tour member who has looked comfortable out there he is inarguably the right favourite for this week's tournament.
Blair Atholl should help Burmester's bid for a first win in his national open. Designed by Gary Player on very the farmland upon which he grew up, this is an exclusive club which likes to tell anyone who'll listen that the course is the 'third-longest in the world'. Wide fairways and huge greens add to an apparent bigger-is-better mantra and at over 8,200 yards in length, everything here is massive.
Johannesburg's altitude will ensure that it's not a complete slog, but there are five par-fours measuring over 500 yards, and four of the five par-fives pass the 600 mark. Everywhere you look, including at transcripts from last year's Sunshine Tour event held here, the sheer size of the place is inescapable, and altitude or not players were commenting on how many mid-irons they hit. These days, that's noteworthy.
Burmester is one of the most powerful players in the field but, like Bezuidenhout, he's not one to run scared of. And in CHARL SCHWARTZEL, we have a player who has achieved far more, who seemingly remains in good enough form, and who boasts an advantage which cements his status as the best bet in golf this week.
Schwartzel is one of the few proven players in this field with experience of the course, and plenty of it. He's a member here at Blair Atholl and while Thriston Lawrence holds the official tournament course record courtesy of a final-round 64 last October, Schwartzel has knocked it round here in 60 blows when playing casual golf with his friends.
Not only has Schwartzel been a member at the course, but for a while one of the luxury homes which surround it belonged to him. He lived here for several years around the time of his Masters win, and while these things should be taken with a pinch of salt, Player created this course with Augusta in mind. Watch for the signature fourth hole, a tribute to the 12th, as evidence of that.
Langasque's form has a straightforwardly progressive look to it having gone MC-28-20-9 over his last four starts, but what I really like is that his long-game has followed a similar trajectory. Week after week his ball-striking has improved and that's why he said he felt a tad disappointed to only manage ninth at Houghton.
This long course will demand that he keeps hitting his favourite club off the tee and provides an ideal chance for him to do what he did back in March, and follow one top-10 in South Africa with another. All told he has 11 top-30s from 15 visits, including 21st and second in two starts in this event, and it's a part of the world he loves visiting.
Schaper showed promise last week and briefly held the official course record here after a second-round 65 in the Blair Atholl Championship, but he is a neat-and-tidy golfer and my view is that powerhouses like Nienaber ought to hold sway.
It can be the case that ultra-long courses actually level the playing field, because everyone is hitting wedges into par-fives, and we've seen that at Green Eagle in Hamburg recently. However, the altitude and the heat which is forecast this week might just mean that the likes of Nienaber can really hammer home their advantage.
Stone won this event in 2016, beating Bezuidenhout, Grace and Burmester among others, and added finishes of seventh at Randpark and 14th at Sun City to what's a good record on home soil.
We know all about the class of this sweet-swinging former winner of the Scottish Open, and there's a fairly simple explanation for what's been a poor year: his short-game. Stone's work around the green has been poor for six months now, and he hasn't enjoyed a really good week with the putter since the Irish Open.
What he continues to do is drive the ball to a very high standard and with his approach play much improved for the return home, not to mention a better putting display, there was actually enough to like about what appears a modest share of 44th in Joburg.
As for building on it, I'm drawn to the fact his best performance of the year came when fifth at the aforementioned Green Eagle, which plays to a similar length at around 7,800 yards. His best performances in 2021 came at Albatros, a course which favours the big hitters, and Sun City, a Player design which again pushes towards the 8,000-yard mark.
Other standouts this year came in the MyGolfLife Open when 18th, that being a co-sanctioned event on home soil, and when 20th behind Ryan Fox at Al Hamra, again where strong driving was vital. All of this paints the picture of a player who is doing better than he did last year and who wouldn't need to improve much to feature over the coming fortnight.
Certainly, he'll be slashed for Leopard Creek if he does show more life here and now is the time to chance him.
Dylan Mostert is a big-hitting South African who played well enough here last October and was 18th despite a poor back-nine on Sunday. He strikes me as one who could continue his progress and I wouldn't totally dismiss Tristen Strydom, for whom the case last week was as much about his considerable potential as it was some course form.
But if there is a superstar in this field, then it could well be either Casey Jarvis, slashed after a superb effort last week, or one of a strong group of amateurs, among whom the top-ranked is Christiaan Maas.
Maas is undeniably hard to assess as he embarks on a college career at the University of Texas, but last time he played at home he won on the Big Easy Tour having led wire-to-wire. Two missed cuts in the SA Open underline the class divide he still has to bridge, although he has been 32nd and 12th in two Sunshine Tour starts, the latter of them here in the Blair Atholl Championship.
That should help him find his feet and with some similarly-ranked Australian amateurs going off at much shorter prices to topple Cam Smith, it wasn't surprising to see the early 400/1 disappear and I expect the same will quickly happen to odds around the 250 and 300/1 mark.
He's sure to have drawn encouragement from the performance of Jarvis last week and there's probably not a great deal between them, either long-term or in the here and now, for all that Jarvis has already made the switch to professional golf. For that reason I can see the appeal, although winning is an enormous ask and it arguably makes more sense to chance the likes of him, Aldrich Potgieter and Kyle De Beer in side markets.
These might be the next wave of South African talent, and after Jarvis's display last week there's certainly hope that a real superstar lies among them. This week, however, it might just be time for Schwartzel to at last get his hands on the SA Open trophy.
Posted at 1745 GMT on 28/11/22
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