by @betdetective

Skeeter’s Open Championship preview and tips will be up tomorrow but in the meantime here are Bet Detective’s long shots which he’s suggesting to back on Betfair with the plan of laying at least one of them back at a much shorter price.

The 147th Open Championship starts on Thursday from Carnoustie in Scotland and with the weather set to be benign it could prove to be a rare low scoring event.

There will be drives of 400+ yards down the firm fairways of the 7,402 yard par 71 layout and avoiding the many bunkers will be key.

This renewal of the Open has the look of a very open tournament and i’m happy to completely ignore all those at the head of the market and take a scatter gun approach at several players at triple figure odds. For once, the big hitters will not have such a great advantage with only two par 5’s, one of which (the 6th) will only be reachable in two if its played downwind.

The strategy is to back the following players for one unit each and assess the market after round one to see if we can lay any one of them  to lock in a profit, or give us a free ride. 

First up we have the 2007 Open Championship winner, Stewart Cink, and while he may not seem the most obvious winner – and of course he’s not – he does have some very appealing bits of form next to his name. He won the Open at Carnoustie for starters and he’s in the midst of real career resurgence having finished 2nd at the Travelers Championship last month and then 4th at the St Jude in his next start two weeks later. His overall form when he plays in the Open is very solid with two top 10’s and a further three top 30’s in his last 10 starts.

Back CINK at $270 on Betfair

Retief Goosen, like Stewart Cink, is a Major winner in the twilight of his career, and a player who plays a pretty light schedule these days, in fact he’s only played in three of the last 10 weeks but in the middle of the three tournaments, sandwiched by two missed cuts, was a 6th placed finish at the St Jude Classic, where Cink finished 4th. He has two top six Open finishes in his last eight starts.

Back GOOSEN at $1000 on Betfair

Martin Kaymer has become a bit of an enigma and his recent form figures do nothing to dispel this theory: mc, mc, 2, mc, 8. The ability is still there but so is a clear issue with consistency.

Bearing in mind his recent 2nd placed finish at the BMW International on the European Tour let’s list a few of his career wins:

USOPEN- 2014

PGA Championship – 2010

Players Championship – 2014

Scottish Open – 2009

Alfred Dunhill Links – 2010

I’m happy to take a chance on him performing much better than his huge odds suggest.

Back KAYMER at $350 on Betfair