The annual task of picking a winner from the field of invitees to the Nedbank Golf Challenge at Sun City has been complicated this time around by the Presidents Cup.
The field has been expanded from 12 to 18 in order to accommodate as many players from the United States and international teams as possible. David Toms was a late withdrawal with what was described as a wrist injury, but may as easily have been a sore pituitary gland.
The visible strain the players were under proved conclusively that the Presidents Cup is not an exhibition match any more. Nick Price, the unchallenged winner on an annual basis of game’s nicest guy, was moved to break his putter over his knee when he missed the putt that would have earned a vital half against Kenny Perry.
Price was so embarrassed when he saw what he had done that he tucked the bent shaft under his arm to hide it before striding off to shake Perry’s hand. Perry, an unknown Kentuckian in South Africa before last week, gained legions of fans by breaking into tears. Price has had his putter reshafted for this week’s contest.
Such was the emotional fallout from the tournament that ended at The Links on Sunday, that it would be hard to blame anyone for not wishing to participate this week. It would be harder still to imagine any of the Presidents Cup participants actually winning, but that’s not how Ernie Els feels about it.
Els took two days off after Sunday’s drama-packed three-hole playoff with Tiger Woods, then went out and shot a seven under par 65 in the Pro-Am at the Gary Player Country Club.
He said: ‘Pressure like we had last week is why I play the game. It was very similar to the playoff at the British Open last year. You just try and draw from previous experiences in those kind of situations and try to survive.â€
So the television images of Els with a thousand-mile stare, all the colour drained from his cheeks and a white-knuckle grip on the club were wrong. He was enjoying it. And my cat plays the ukulele. Of course he’ll enjoy it looking back, like the man who head butted the wall because it was so nice when it stopped. But does he have anything left for this week? You’d better believe it.
‘Of course, the more players there are the more competition there is — they are all in form, but you play against a golf course, you play against yourself and if you can do what you should do, you should be okay.â€
In other words, yes I’m tired and yes it’s been a long season, but this is my tournament and no one’s going to take it from me.
Els has won three times in the past four years and last year finished with a 63 to stroll to an eight-shot victory. It is plain to see that if Els is on his game everyone else is playing for second place, even though world number two Vijay Singh said after the Pro-Am on Wednesday that he was hoping to ‘take some of the money from Ernie’s trust fundâ€.
This year’s winner will have to stay out of the rough, which is at levels not seen since Corey Pavin won in 1995. Pavin’s score of 276 was the highest of the past decade, the decade when space-age equipment began to overwhelm golf course design. Els won with 267 last year, a score that would have beaten Pavin by nine shots.
Pavin won by keeping the ball in play and there is a golfer here this week who resembles the slightly built American more than somewhat. Tim Clark was the beneficiary of Toms’s withdrawal and won the Pro-Am with a 69.
Clark said: ‘I’m not the longest hitter in the field, in fact I’m one of the shorter hitters, but you are going to have to hit the fairways. If you are driving the ball well you can attack.â€
That is despite yet more tinkering with the course that has made it more challenging for the superstars here this week and bordering on the impossible for the rest of us. The greatest change has been at the 17th, a beautiful par four where Els made an eagle two during his triumphal march last year.
Traditionally the 17th has been a stroll along the lakeside, admiring the bird life and hoping that the ever-present motorboat will run out of gas and dump the para-sailor in the middle of nowhere. Now the water is actually in play for the golfers as well, with the green having been moved 50m to the left.
The resultant island green is a major aesthetic improvement, but it won’t affect the hole’s playability one iota for the field this week. The reason is that these guys are good. Anyone can win, but the man who took on Tiger Woods in the gloaming last week is the most likely.
Field: Chris DiMarco, Fred Funk, Jay Haas, Charles Howell III, Jerry Kelly, Kenny Perry (all US); Tim Clark, Ernie Els, Retief Goosen (all South Africa); Robert Allenby, Stuart Appleby, Stephen Leaney, Adam Scott (all Australia); Darren Clarke (Northern Ireland); Padraig Harrington (Ireland) Sergio Garcia (Spain); Nick Price (Zimbabwe); Vijay Singh (Fiji)