– Surely, the main key to playing well on the Majlis course at the Emirates Golf Club is knowing how to choose the right line of shot from the tee. You have to be accurate because there are many holes that dogleg left and some that dogleg right, so it’s advisable to align the landing point to avoid ending up in the rough, whether short or long. The truth is that Dubai offers a wide range of options for lining up the shot. The skyline that dominates much of the Emirati course acts as a great assistant. “Look, aim at the skyscraper with the United Arab Emirates flag, or the Batman one (Warner Bros advertisement), or the one with the tip that looks like a pencil…”. Conversations like this between caddie and player are constant on this course. If you ever play it, don’t forget this advice: on the 18th, aim at the orange juicer and on the 14th at the lemon one. When you play these holes, you’ll know which buildings they are… And if you don’t figure it out, don’t blame me for missing the fairway.
– Precisely among these juicers, it seems that Viktor Hovland has found some light at the end of the tunnel. The Norwegian is very optimistic, but surely he isn’t surprised that the rest of the world is sceptical given his technical-emotional swings. “I have the certainty that it’s going to be a good year,” he said today. The reason is that in the last two weeks training here in Dubai, escaping the Nordic cold, he has found a good feeling. “It started to feel almost like it used to. And it was very nice to see. Because, conceptually, I understood what I was doing, but for some reason, it was very difficult to reproduce it. I couldn’t understand what I had to feel or how I achieved it. And I would say that last Saturday it started to look much better and since then it has been a slow and steady progress every day. It might be a bit quick for this week, but I’m very happy with the trend, with how everything is going. Yes, maybe it’s a bit early this week, but I think this year is going to be a good year.” It should be taken with caution. We’ll see what happens this week.
– A total of 998 players have played the Hero Dubai Desert Classic throughout a long history dating back to 1989. That is, this year the 1,000th player will debut. Such honour goes to Ethan Fang, an American amateur who won the Amateur Championship last year and tees off in the first match of the day from the 10th alongside Kobori and Schneider. Kobori will be the 999th debutant.
– Pablo Larrazábal is playing his 18th Dubai Desert Classic, while for Rafa Cabrera Bello it will be the 16th. They are the two Spaniards who have played this tournament the most among those here this week. However, they are still far from the 27 editions played by Miguel Ángel Jiménez… And because it became a Rolex Series and he lost his former winner’s category to play, otherwise he would already be above 30 tournaments…
– It points to a complicated opening day at the Emirates. The weather forecast assures that quite a bit of wind will blow throughout the day. They talk about an intensity of about 30-35 kilometres per hour with higher gusts. We’ll see. More wind than has blown today was also expected. Friday will also be windy, and it seems Saturday will be the calmest day. We’ll have to see it day by day.
– Tyrrell Hatton caused a technical tie last year between England and Spain in the Emirate of Dubai. Both countries have won a total of eleven times here. However, Spain has achieved it with eight different players and the English with seven. Will there be a tiebreaker this week? We just point out that the Armada’s feelings are good.
– By the way, Hatton can also break another tie. He has five wins in the Rolex Series, the same as Jon Rahm. If he wins, he will have six. Would there be a call to Jon to rub in the overtaking? “No way,” said Tyrrell, “if I say that, he’ll respond that he has two Majors and there’s no discussion. For now, he’s still beating me,” he said with laughter. In this regard, Hatton has openly said that this is the year to find the click in the Majors. Last year he was already close at the US Open and now he wants to achieve the first one.
