European Tour: Omega European Masters Preview
By Matt Coles
The PGA TOUR season may have finished on Sunday, but the European Tour continues this week with the Omega European Masters.
The Omega European Masters has been part of the European Tour since the tour’s inception in 1972, with the tournament having been held as the Swiss Open for the first time in 1923.
It became known as the European Masters Swiss Open in 1982, before then dropping the Swiss Open from the title ten years later.
It has been known as the Omega European Masters, through sponsorship, since 2001. Since the event was sanctioned by the European Tour, Seve Ballesteros is the only man to have won the event three times.
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Manuel Pinero also won the event twice in the 1970s, while Argentinian Eduardo Romero won the event in 1994 and 2000.
Three men have won the event twice in the last decade. Alex Noren (2009, 2016) and Thomas Bjorn (2011, 2013) have two European Masters titles to their name, while Matt Fitzpatrick is the reigning two-time champion, having won the event in 2017 and 2018.
The Golf-Club Crans-sur-Sierre hosts the event and has done since the very first Swiss Open almost 100 years ago.
Colin Montgomerie, the eight-time European Tour Order of Merit winner, won the event in 1996 with a score of 260 (-20, par 70), the lowest accumulative score, while Jerry Anderson’s -27 (261, par 72) to win the 1984 tournament is the lowest score to par.
For this year’s event, the Crans-sur-Sierre course is a par-70, with two nines of 35. The front nine sees a single par-5, which measures at 633 yards, along with two par-4s over the 500-yard mark.
There are also two par-3s on the front nine, along with three on the back nine, with the 235-yard 16th being one of the signature holes on the golf course.
There are some packed tee times in both the morning and afternoon sessions on the opening two days, with play starting on both the 1st and 10th holes.
Two-time champion Alex Noren plays alongside Eddie Pepperell and Jorge Campillo on Thursday and Friday, starting at 08:20 on opening day.
Ten minutes later, the British trio of FedEx Cup winner Rory McIlroy, former World No.1 Lee Westwood and four-time European Tour winner Matt Wallace play together.
Current two-time champion Matt Fitzpatrick will tee off alongside former Masters Champion Sergio Garcia and 2017 Race To Dubai winner Tommy Fleetwood.
Erik van Rooyen, the winner of last week’s Scandinavian Invitation, will play alongside Scottish Open winner Bernd Wiesberger and former Masters champion Danny Willett.
The first two groups will tee off at 07:40, with Ashley Chesters, Mathias Eggenberger and Joachim B Hansen starting on the 1st, while the 10th will see Jaco Van Zyl, Sam Horsfield and David Horsey get the action underway.
Erik Van Rooyen Breaks Euro Tour Duck With Scandinavian Invitation Win. dark. Next
Selected Tee Times (* = 10th tee start):
- 08:20* & 13:20: Alex Noren (SWE), Eddie Pepperell (ENG), Jorge Campillo (ESP)
- 08:30* & 13:30: Rory McIlroy (NIR), Lee Westwood (ENG), Matt Wallace (ENG)
- 08:40* & 13:40: Ryan Fox (NZL), Thomas Pieters (BEL), Andrea Pavan (ITA)
- 08:50* & 13:50: Luke Donald (ENG), Robert Karlsson (SWE), Miguel Angel Jimenez (ESP)
- 13:20 & 08:20*: Padraig Harrington (IRL), Lucas Bjerregard (DEN), Robert MacIntyre (SCO)
- 13:30 & 08:30*: Sergio Garcia (ESP), Matt Fitzpatrick (ENG), Tommy Fleetwood (ENG)
- 13:40 & 08:40*: Danny Willett (ENG), Erik van Rooyen (RSA), Bernd Wiesberger (AUT)