A Test on the Highveld is normally a sure sign of a break in the weather, and drought-stricken farmers in the north were celebrating the rain that almost saved the West Indies in Centurion at the beginning of the week.
Joy should be unconfined, then, at the return to Johannesburg of the Alfred Dunhill Championship. The second of the Sunshine Tour events co-sanctioned by the European Tour has become synonymous with thunderstorms of the wet and windy kind.
This year is no different, with rain predicted at Houghton for the duration of the tournament. The rain has come too late to protect the course from some of the world’s best golfers, however, and the combination of minimal rough (blazed out of existence by the sun) and soft greens should provide some exceptionally low scores.
Defending champion Mark Foster said: ‘With the rain the greens are a little slower than last year. The ball isn’t going as far and a couple of the holes are playing a little longer, but again the greens are softer so you can hit the ball a little nearer.â€
Foster had a frustrating year after winning for the first time on the European Tour and had to take three months off in midseason as the result of a back operation. At Houghton he came through a six-man play-off, the largest in tour history, to win, rolling in a huge eagle putt on the 18th to beat, among others, Trevor Immelman.
Immelman successfully defended his South African Open title last week and has shot up to 37th in the world rankings as a result. If he maintains a top 50 spot through to April he will qualify for the United States Masters and thus play all four majors of the year for the first time. He too equates Houghton with rain.
‘We are kind of used to it for this tournament, we haven’t been very lucky with the weather here over the past few years although last year wasn’t too bad. Even then we still had a delay on the Saturday and I think this [rain] is in for the week with the report I have seen.â€
The Alfred Dunhill has a habit of producing debut wins. When first played in 1996 Germany’s Sven Struver beat off the challenge of Ernie Els, Foster won it last year and in 2002 Englishman Justin Rose finally fulfilled the prodigious expectations raised by his amateur career.
Rose has been in South Africa for a month already, staying with his mother at Fancourt. He has gone from being a high-profile struggler to a conspicuous achiever in the past three years and has now qualified for the US Tour where he will campaign for about three months until after the Masters.