COVER STORY
AFP
England’s Danny Willett will be filled with confidence in 2015 after romping to an impressive victory in South Africa last month 44
HK GOLFER・JAN 2015
HKGOLFER.COM
Next
Big
Things Lewine Mair examines the young players who appear destined to make a bid for stardom in 2015.
T
hey are not out of the usual mould. The players in line to make their mark around the world in 2015 mostly have, or had, something a little different about them, starting with England’s Danny Willett. For years, this former Walker Cup man had come across as a kindly choirboy, a fine golfer but not one who was obviously shaping to make for trouble among those hardy hombres at the top of the world order. That impression was one which would change over the Christmas season. Somewhat disconcertingly for those he left in his wake, the 27-year-old Willett became more of a baby-face killer than anything else as he won the Nedbank Golf Challenge at Sun City by a four-shot margin. What is more, he was able to take a lingering delight in his slaughtering of the rest in that he was already four ahead when he arrived on the 72nd tee.
HKGOLFER.COM
Afterwards, memories were jogged as to why this former English Amateur champion’s only other win in the professional arena – it was in the BMW International Open in Cologne in 2012 – had made so little impact. The answer, here, was that he had taken so long to shrug off Marcus Fraser – until the fourth extra hole to be precise – that the various writers had neither the space nor the time to do the victory justice. All the players nowadays make automatic mention of their “team” when couching their victory speeches but Willett’s words after the Nedba n k included some up-to-t he-minute thinking. He mentioned how his wife, Nicole, whom he married in 2013, had missed only one of his competitive rounds in the whole of 2014. He further endeared himself to his Europeanbased admirers in his reply to a question as to whether he saw his South African success as a springboard to the US Tour. Willett began by explaining how playing on the PGA Tour had indeed been a goal of
HK GOLFER・JAN 2015
45
The next player deserving of a mention among those poised to loom large in 2015 is the 24-year-old Brooks Koepka. He stands apart from his US counterparts in that he is an American who opted to begin his professional career on the European Challenge Tour.
AFP
Clockwise from opposite: Brooks Koepka will be looking to build on his end-of-season form; 2015 could be a breakthrough year for the impressive Jordan Spieth; Kiradech Aphibarnrat has the game to succeed at the very highest level
46
HK GOLFER・JAN 2015
his when he was younger. “They ’ve got everything out there”, he marvelled, before suddenly changing course. “To be honest,” he said, or words to that effect, “I don’t care how good the PGA Tour is; it just isn’t going to match up to this.” The next player deserving of a mention among those poised to loom large in 2015 is the 24-year-old Brooks Koepka. He stands apart from his US counterparts in that he, like his long-time friend and sparring partner, Peter Uilhein, is an American who opted to begin his professional career on the European Challenge Tour. Koepka won three tournaments on this secondary circuit in 2013 to graduate to the full European Tour and he then finished fourth in last year’s US Open to win himself
a card on the PGA circuit. Like Willett, he signed off in style in 2014, handing in a last-round 65 in Turkey to win by a shot from Ian Poulter. “I’d been knocking at the door [on both sides of the Atlantic] and on each of those occasions I learned something,” he said. The two-tour schedule on which Koepka has his heart set for 2015 may well ask too much of the young man but for the moment he is bursting with eager anticipation. And who, given his heady combination of youth and massive hitting, would not be at this point in his career? Not h i ng, p erhaps, tel l s more ab out Ko e pk a ’s l e n g t h a n d s t r e n g t h t h a n a conversation which was overheard on the tee – yes, on the tee – of the 503-yard fourth at Crans-sur-Sierre on a practice day prior to the 2013 Omega European Masters. Koepka to Uilhein: “Do you think we can reach the green today?” “I suppose we might,” returned Uilhein, not ing t hat t hey had t he wind at t heir backs and that they would be landing on the downslope. Uilhein’s drive finished 25 yards short of the putting surface, with Koepka’s but ten yards away. Obviously, altitude came into it – Cranssur-Sierre is 4,920 feet about sea level – but even so ... Jonathan Spieth is another A merican who had his confidence boosted at the tail end of 2014 when, with his enviably smooth swing, he won back-to-back titles in Australia and Florida. Spieth was more obviously cut out for stardom than many of his peers in that he had matched Tiger Woods’ feat in winning the US Junior title more than once. Unlike Woods, though, he did not have a matching haul of results in the senior arena because he turned professional at the tender age of 19. It was an alarmingly early switch for an American, albeit one which was at least partially vindicated when he won his first PGA event a week ahead of his 20th birthday. As well as those end-of-2014 triumphs, Spiet h had a rat her more successf u l Ryder Cup than most of his compatriots, contributing two and a half points to the US cause. Not, it has to be said, that too many would have noticed in that he was paired with Patrick Reed, a magnet of a man when it comes to attracting more than his whack of publicity. At the start of last year, it will be recalled, Reed made that never-to-beforgotten comment about how he belonged HKGOLFER.COM
in the top five in the world. (The statistics did not bear that out, though no one would be surprised were this out-and-out individual to make that proud boast come true this summer.) T here is somet h i ng about t he more com for tably-contou red T ha i players to suggest that they are all heading in the right direction while taking an alternative route – a gym-free route – from the majority. They are a happy band of golfers whose fast-improving results reflect their joie de vivre. Not too many years ago, Boonchu Ruangkit was the only Thai golfer of note. Today, as many as seven Thais feature in the top 250 in the world, with the winner of the 2013 Malaysian Open arguably the best prospect of them all. Anujit Hirunratanakorn, who plays under the name of Kiradech Aphibarnrat, slipped from 59th in the world in 2013 to 134th in 2014 but he has way too much talent to lie low for long. At 25, he is dripping with feel and flair and has one of the strongest minds – a Buddhist mind – in the business. SSP Chowrasia was the first Indian caddieturned-player to win on the European Tour and today people are looking to the 23-yearold Rashid Kahn to follow in his footsteps. T h is you ng ma n , who played h is f i rst professional tournament with a set of clubs lent to him by a relative who was a caddieturned-professional, finished third on the Indian Order of Merit in 2011, second in 2012 and first in 2013. In 2014, he won what was his second Asian Tour title. For Kahn to break through to the next level would be good for rather more than merely the player himself: it would give hope to every would-be golfer among the caddying fraternity out East whilst simultaneously doing something at least to prove that golf is a game for all. Tommy Fleetwood and Oliver Fisher are two more ready to take the next step in 2015 while, looking at the older fry, such as Lee Westwood and Padraig Harrington are both stubbornly intent on showing such as Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods that they can still play a bit. West wood won in Thailand over t he festive period with Harrington, that threetime major winner, picking up his first official title in four years – the Indonesian Open – in the same period. Finally, of the newcomers, what of Renato Paratore, the Italian teenager who is set to join Matteo Manassero in the IMG stable? In many eyes, Paratore probably stands out HKGOLFER.COM
as much as any of the above. Instead of going about his business at snail’s pace, he plays at a speed redolent of golfers of the 1920s. Alas, this admirable characteristic, no more than Willett’s old choirboy image, is unlikely to persist. “As happened to me,” said Manassero, with a sad shake of the head, “Renato is going to have to slow down. Playing quickly out here simply doesn’t work.” HK GOLFER・JAN 2015
47