Great opportunity for several emerging Australasians at Dunhill Links
Kazuma Kobori – gets to test his significant game against some of the world’s best – image PGA Tour of Australasia.
This week’s Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, at the Old Course St Andrews and the Carnoustie and Kingsbarns Golf Links in Scotland, provides a rare opportunity for several of Australasia’s emerging players to not only experience some of the game’s finest links golf layouts but also play in a US$5 million event for the first time.
The top ten available players from the top 30 of the 20923 / 2024 PGA Tour of Australasia Order of Merit get their chance to play the pro-am formatted event, one of the few such events on a recognised tour. It joins the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am and the New Zealand Open as events at this level where professionals partner amateurs in addition to playing a significant and lucrative event in their own right.
The event has the added significance of players such as Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm, Billy Horschel, Tommy Fleetwood and Billy Horschel teeing it up, adding to a much stronger field than many of the Australasian Tour players have competed against.
New Zealand’s Kazuma Kobori and Australians Daniel Gale, Brett Coletta, Matthew Griffin, David Micheluzzi, Jak Carter, Cameron John, Kade McBride, Lachlan Barker and Jordan Zunic have earned the right to play the event courtesy of their performances on the Australasian Tour last season.
Kobori led the Australasian Tour’s Order of Merit when the season finished in March but he has had little joy since his great start to the year when he won an impressive three of six events late on the Australasian Tour’s calendar.
Kobori has missed five cuts in nine events since with a best of 28th in Morocco so his performance will be watched with interest especially given he becomes a full fledged member of the DP World Tour in November as a result of finishing atop the Australians Tour’s Order of Merit.
New Zealanders Daniel Hillier and Sam Jones are also in the field courtesy of the DP World Tour cards they hold.
The last and only Australasian to win the event was New Zealander Ryan Fox who, in a stellar season in 2022, added this as his third of four DP World Tour wins to date.
