Golf expert Ben Coley has five selections for the Qatar Masters, as the DP World Tour bids farewell to the Middle East until November.
Golf betting tips: Qatar Masters
2pts e.w. Oliver Lindell at 30/1 (Sky Bet, Paddy Power, Betfair 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
2pts e.w. Marcus Armitage at 35/1 (Betfred 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8; 33/1 General)
1.5pts e.w. Martin Couvra at 45/1 (Sky Bet, Paddy Power, Betfair 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Andrea Pavan at 60/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Jacob Skov Olesen at 80/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
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The Qatar Masters is the hidden gem among the DP World Tour’s Middle East mainstays and therefore a fitting way to sign off until November.
It might not carry the glitz and glamour of a Dubai Desert Classic, the end-of-season sense of significance inherent to an Abu Dhabi or DP World Tour Championship, but what it does have is Doha GC, which ranks alongside Yas Links as one of the best courses we visit in this part of the world.
Like all of them, Doha has its flaws – the ninth has had all fun removed by a back tee, the 16th might be the least interesting driveable par-four on the circuit – but this familiar terrain always serves up a good test. It demands more than brawn (partly because nobody can reach the ninth and everybody can reach the 16th) and historically has favoured a different type of player to that which dominates at say the Earth Course.
That type is best described as adept in the wind, often specifically on links courses in the UK and Ireland. They’re a world away from here and you may not see a single bump-and-run all week, but some of the skills do transfer, particularly the ability to flight crisp iron shots. They’ve been key to every renewal since the event returned from Education City across town, including when Haotong Li clung on grimly this time last year.
With Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen in second, this was a renewal which defied the trajectory of an event which no longer attracts a top-class field. Both these players are now on the PGA Tour and, with 2023 champion Sami Valimaki waiting for them there and 2024 champion Rikuya Hoshino also having earned a card before, Doha is likely to again throw up a quality leaderboard. You can’t really fake it around here.
Regarding that links form, how’s this for a roll-of-honour? All of Sergio Garcia, Chris Wood, Paul Lawrie, Thomas Bjorn, Adam Scott, Henrik Stenson and Ernie Els have either won or contended for an Open Championship, while Branden Grace and Robert Karlsson are Dunhill Links champions. Another winner of that, Oli Wilson, has been second here; Dunhill Links runner-up Peter Uihlein has won at this course.
Even the less objectively excellent golfers to have captured this title have links form of some kind: Ewen Ferguson the Boys’ Amateur, Mikko Ilonen the real thing. Eddie Pepperell won the Qatar Masters in 2018 then finished fourth in the Open that summer, a feat Haotong Li bettered when bagging his second Open top-three at Portrush. And on and on and on it goes. Quality iron players with links form is what we really want.
More to come from Oliver
Both Patrick Reed and Daniel Hillier will feel like they ought to have won last week and they’re the most likely winners here, too. Reed made some uncharacteristic short-game mistakes before losing a play-off while Hillier, beaten a shot in the end, produced some of his best ball-striking and worst putting in months. As each of them has Doha form, cases are not difficult to construct.
If there’s a negative bar the shorter prices it’s that both have been right in the thick of things for three weeks now so I’ll hope they run out of gas, therefore opening up this tournament, perhaps to a first win for OLIVER LINDELL.
The Finn has started the season impressively, closing with a round of 64 in the Dubai Invitational (15th), producing three good rounds in a Rolex Series event (26th) and then bagging a first top-10 finish of the campaign in Bahrain.
Throughout each of these starts his propensity to make a costly error has been his undoing, Thursday’s triple-bogey eight at Royal GC taking him from seven-under through 13 to having to find a late birdie to shoot 67.
Tidy up those errors and he’ll kick on this year and I’m hopeful he can do that on his second look at Doha, having finished 14th a year ago. That came amid a run of 44-MC-MC-MC elsewhere, well before he started to look comfortable on the DP World Tour, and he didn’t putt well either.
Now firmly established as one of the brightest young talents on the Tour and with his putting improved since the Christmas break, Lindell heads to a course where his approach play is a potentially decisive factor. He ranked fifth here last year and has been largely reliable since, gaining strokes in 23 of his subsequent 28 starts.
Bahrain last week was an exception but data from that event is not a great guide to my eye. We’ve had two winners at huge odds in three renewals, it ought to have been three, and some of the most dramatic greens you’ll find anywhere are part of the reason. As well as making putting very tricky, they are capable of compounding the smallest of mistakes and nobody should be hung up on them.
The end result, ninth place, is where we can draw real encouragement, because Lindell tends to get hot and stay hot. He managed a ridiculous eight top-10s in a row on the HotelPlanner Tour in 2024, then last year went 7-8-17-7-13 on this circuit when finding form late in summer.
It’s been a strong start to his second season on the DP World Tour but it took a return to Bahrain (MC in 2025) to get properly competitive, the previous two events both deeper and at courses he hadn’t seen before. Now he goes back to the scene of his first performance of real substance and, providing he can take his medicine when the bad shots do arrive, he looks a likely contender.
Both Matt Wallace and Jesper Svensson have a touch of class, the former in particular, but flying in from California isn’t ideal. The latter continues to struggle badly on the greens while Wallace, seventh in the Dubai Invitational, beat only nine players in the Farmers last week. I’m a big believer in taking PGA Tour players seriously but there can’t be many worse ways to prepare and it’s been a busy month anyway.
Preference is for MARCUS ARMITAGE, who is in the form of his life.
Armitage has contended a couple of times over the last six months, finishing fifth when right in the thick of things in the Open de France, then seventh in the Dubai Invitational. Before the latter he’d signed off a good year with 15th in Mauritius, and he’s since bettered both with seventh in a quality field at the Dubai Desert Classic.
With his putter behaving and his driver solid, Armitage’s brilliant iron play has been able to shine and it’s that which I think will be key to this tournament. He’s gained over a stroke per round in nine of his last 13 starts, hasn’t lost strokes anywhere since the second week in August, and right now has very few peers on the DP World Tour.
🗣 “I look at it and think I can lose everything… We’re trying to break the mould and strive for more and be the best that I can be.”
Things have not always been easy for Marcus Armitage, but the DP World Tour pro has high hopes for 2026 💪
Story 👇https://t.co/KYVGP5c3Jn
— bunkered (@bunkeredgolf) January 27, 2026
More of the same and Armitage will be a big factor at a course which suits him so much better on paper than the Emirates, where he was seventh behind Reed. Granted, four missed cuts here down the years might not support that view but he was fifth in 2022, proving that he can be competitive, and that also came during a good run of form.
By contrast, last year’s was the middle of three missed cuts, in 2024 he’d gone without a top-40 finish in four starts to begin the season (yet still hit it better here), the previous autumn he’d been very much up and down with five missed cuts in seven, and in 2017 he was struggling to find his feet as a DP World Tour rookie.
That 2022 top-five saw him lead the field in strokes-gained tee-to-green, largely thanks to more brilliant iron play, and having since been runner-up in the Dunhill Links he ticks that box too.
Winning here would be his biggest achievement to date and he looks up to it after a welcome week off.
Angel Ayora’s performance last week was galling as his driver cooled and his putting improvements from Dubai failed to carry over. He did produce yet more quality approach play and maybe this place will suit him more, as it seemed to last year, but the price hasn’t shifted far enough to take that chance.
MARTIN COUVRA outperformed him and while 24th wasn’t what backers would’ve hoped for after such an encouraging start to the season, to my eye it’s confirmation that he’s right back in form.
Couvra definitely suffered for being in the mix for PGA Tour status late last year but since that quest ended in defeat, he’s performed respectably in the Nedbank, stormed home for seventh in the Alfred Dunhill, shaken off the rust in the Dubai Invitational, then been 10th in the Dubai Desert Classic.
In the latter we saw his trademark approach play rejoin the party and while that dipped last week, again the course in Bahrain has a chaotic quality. I think we’re better zooming out a little and there were plenty of positives elsewhere in Couvra’s game, particularly with the putter and more solid driving.
With huge-hitting Freddy Schott winning there, I feel the Frenchman will be more comfortable in Doha, where he was fifth on debut, barely making an error. That was also the case in Bahrain, where his short-game proved up to the task with just five dropped shots all week, tied for first in the field.
He doesn’t have much links form to offer that correlation, but Couvra’s Turkish Airlines Open win could yet offer some handy clues. Jorge Campillo (play-off loser here) and Li tied for second, while the likes of Brandon Robinson Thompson, Sam Bairstow, Nacho Elvira, Chris Wood, Marcus Kinhult, Lindell, Matt Jordan and Niklas Lemke were all prominent, all of them with strong Doha form.
It’s one of those potential correlations which isn’t immediately easy to explain but certainly the first three home, plus Joost Luiten in fifth and Elvira in seventh, are among the most reliable iron players on the DP World Tour, so perhaps it’s as simple as that.
Regardless, we know Couvra can score at Doha and I didn’t see anything but encouragement in last week’s performance.
Jacob looks a cracker
A few of those mentioned above made some appeal, particularly Bairstow and Lemke, but at the prices I’d rather take my chances with the gifted JACOB SKOV OLESEN.
He was 12th after a closing 65 in Turkey, an excellent fightback having been a long way behind after the opening round, but what we’re buying into with Olesen is his record on exposed courses which have always pointed towards Doha contenders.
Last August he was third at the Nexo Championship in Aberdeen, he went on to be fifth in the Dunhill Links, and this former winner of the Amateur Championship had already shown up with a big performance on day one of the Open Championship at Portrush.
Olesen spoke there of how much he enjoys playing in the breeze and there’s enough of it around this week, particularly on Thursday and Sunday, to believe that he’ll find this more suitable than any tournament he’s played so far this season.
That’s necessary as he’s yet to crack the top 20, but he did produce some blistering stuff at times in Bahrain before his driver got him into trouble, and he also closed with an excellent 66 in the Dubai Invitational two weeks before that.
I’d also note that while he missed the cut at Doha last year, he did produce some exceptional iron play and with the potential to putt the lights out, more of the same could see him go really well. We’re taking a chance off the tee if anything but with that performance in Turkey plus 19th in a windy KLM Open also in his favour, he’s one I want to be on at 66s and upwards.
Connor Syme won the aforementioned KLM Open, beating a Doha regular in Joakim Lagergren, and his ball-striking was good in both Dubai starts. He’s respected at big odds along with Jason Scrivener, both of them quality iron players, but watch out too for young Daniel Rodrigues.
He’s a player I really like the look of and last week’s return from five weeks off was very encouraging, as he was the only player to shoot more than 73 on day one yet make the cut. In the end, 31st was a fine start to the year following 12th in the Australian Open in December, and as a seemingly accurate player who should be comfortable in the wind, he could bank another decent cheque.
I also considered Ugo Coussaud, a former Lytham Trophy runner-up (two winners of that have gone close here) who was second in this on debut and sixth last week, and Nathan Kimsey, who simply looks a bit short for one who lost his card last season but did play well here as a rookie in 2017.
Preference though is for ANDREA PAVAN, who we can back at about the same odds as last week despite an excellent share of ninth and this being a bit weaker.
That seems a bit strange to me, when you’ve got players like Kimsey, Coussaud and Rafa Cabrera Bello all cut quite significantly for similar performances, and Pavan’s form has more substance to it given that he’d been in the mix for the Dubai Desert Classic beforehand.
This is plainly a lot easier and while a mixed Doha record is perhaps the reason he’s being kept at the same odds as Bahrain, there’s plenty to like about 19th last year and 13th back in 2018, when he entered the final round in fourth place.
Two Dunhill Links top-10s plus fourth place in a Scottish Open offer more encouragement and returning to his Doha record, Pavan averages a stroke gained per round with his approaches in four measured starts (12 rounds) at this course.
That too is promising and with his driver behaving right now, if the putts keep dropping he ought to go really well again.
Posted at 19:00 GMT on 02/02/26
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