Course Overview. Austin Country Club dates back to 1899 and is one of the oldest golf clubs in the state of Texas. The Pete Dye track begins in the hillside before meandering down towards Lake Austin which flanks the back 9 and elevation changes, uneven fairways and pot bunkers will present the players with a significant enough challenge before the Match Play aspect even begins to kick in.
The 7,127 yard, par-71 features 3 lengthy Par 5s of 589, 579 and 585 yards on the 6th, 12th and 16th holes respectively as well as three sub-400 yard par 4s at the 5th, 13th and 18th.
Pete Dye courses are generally no pushover (think Harbour Town, TPC Louisiana, TPC Sawgrass and Whistling Straits) and although Match Play format is generally set up for more attacking, risk-reward golf, the layout here provides a lot more than a beautifully scenic backdrop.
In preparation for the 2016 event when the WGC moved here, the golf course underwent a complete restoration to bring it back in line with Dye’s original design. Greens were extended and re-laid with TifEagle Bermuda, plus the fairways were also updated to Bermudagrass as well as additional bunkering which was added throughout. This year the Bermuda also contains a Poa Trivialis overseed.
Tournament Stats. We’ve published some WGC Match Play history stats going back to 1999 to help with your research: Form Stats | Event Stats | Combined Stats.
Predictor Model. Our published Predictor Model is available here. As always you can build your own model using the variables available.
Winners & Prices. 2019: Kevin Kisner, 80/1; 2018: Bubba Watson, 50/1; 2017: Dustin Johnson, 10/1; 2016: Jason Day, 14/1; 2015 Rory McIlroy, 11/1; 2014: Jason Day, 20/1; 2013: Matt Kuchar, 35/1; 2012: Hunter Mahan, 50/1; 2011: Luke Donald, 35/1; 2010: Ian Poulter, 28/1.
Weather Forecast. The latest weather forecast for Austin, Texas is here.
A cool start on Wednesday before a weather front brings overnight rain into Thursday, accompanied by wind gusting 25-30mph on Thursday. From there it calms down and warms up a little for the rest of the event, with temperatures eventually reaching the mid-70s Fahrenheit in the sunshine.
Format. Players are allocated one of 16 groups of 4 players, each containing one of the seeded players and three others as drawn on Monday. A round-robin format follows for the first 3 days with each player facing the other 3 in their group over Wednesday to Friday and the winner of each group based on the results of those matches, or the winner of a deciding playoff if there’s a tie at the top, will advance to the knockout stages.
16 players will become 8, then 4 then 2 following a straight knockout format commencing on Saturday morning and the final pair will battle it out in the final on Sunday alongside the consolation 3rd/4th place play-off.
Incoming Form: Kevin Kisner in 2019 was very much the exception to some pretty solid rules when deciphering who might win this quirky event.
Before Kisner’s win. the previous 5 winners of this event had each won an event on either the PGA Tour, or in the case of Rory McIlroy on the European Tour, in their last 5 starts, and going back to 2010, each winner had at least one top-10 finish in their last 4 starts, so current form had proven to be a very good pointer in recent times:
- 2019: Kevin Kisner: 24/58/MC/7/69/57/26/28/27/23/22/24
- 2018: Bubba Watson: 17/MC/10/69/51/67/MC/40/35/1/9/66
- 2017: Dustin Johnson: 18/8/1/6/35/3/6/2/MC/3/1/1
- 2016: Jason Day: 1/12/1/1/12/1/10/10/MC/11/23/1
- 2015: Rory McIlroy: 5/8/2/2/2/15/2/1/MC/9/11/4
- 2014: Jason Day: 32/53/8/25/13/4/14/1/6/9/2/64
- 2013: Matt Kuchar: 8/MC/38/35/54/10/7/11/9/5/16/38
- 2012: Hunter Mahan: 19/43/8/42/2/7/WD/4/6/MC/15/24
- 2011: Luke Donald: 3/46/MC/15/2/37/2/3/3/9/8/MC
- 2010: Ian Poulter: 15/19/9/MC/20/1/45/5/9/5/2/MC
Event Form. Going back to 2014, the last 6 winners of this had reached the quarter-finals at least once in the past prior to picking up the trophy. None of the winners going back to 2010 were making their debut in this event, so some experience looks important when finding the winner:
- 2019: Kevin Kisner: 38/17/2
- 2018: Bubba Watson: 4/17/9/9/17/28/9
- 2017: Dustin Johnson: 33/33/33/9/33/33/17/5
- 2016: Jason Day: 9/17/3/1/52
- 2015: Rory McIlroy: 5/17/17/2/33/17
- 2014: Jason Day: 9/17/3
- 2013: Matt Kuchar: 17/3/5
- 2012: Hunter Mahan: 17/17/33/9
- 2011: Luke Donald: 9/9/17/17/9/9
- 2010: Ian Poulter: 5/4/33/9/17/9
Tournament Trends & Key Factors.
Digging too deep into past results often throws up nothing more than a red herring or two when it comes to Match Play and this event in particular. Expect the unexpected and keep stakes low would be my advice, however let’s have a go at applying some kind of framework to this week’s selections.
It’s interesting to look at the prices of the last 10 winners of this event: Ogilvy was 25/1 back in 2009, Poulter 28/1 in 2010, Donald 35/1 in 2011, Mahan 50/1 in 2012, Kuchar was 35/1 in 2013, Day was 20/1 in 2014, McIlroy was 11/1 in 2015, Day was 14/1 in 2016, DJ was 10/1 in 2017 and Bubba was 50/1 in 2018. Kevin Kisner’s win in 2019 the last time this was played was the longest of bunch at 80/1, although he’d made it all the way to the final the year before so it wasn’t exactly a bolt from the blue to see him feature again.
Taking 80/1 as our limit of the potential winner, around half of the field are priced outside of that bracket and with 7 successful matches required to lift the trophy perhaps there’s more than just coincidence that players from the top half of the betting have succeeded on each of those occasions.
In contrast though, there’s still been some value in the each-way places with Lucas Bjerregaard (140/1) making the semis in 2019, Kevin Kisner (125/1) making the final in 2018, Bill Haas (90/1) and Hideto Tanihara (300/1) both making the semi-finals in 2017 and Rafa Cabrera-Bello (125/1) finishing 3rd the year before. The result from Harding Park in 2015 also produced a couple of 3-figure each-way places in the shape of Gary Woodland (125/1) and Danny Willett (150/1), neither of whom had shown much in the way of form before progressing all the way through to Sunday’s matches.
The course here on paper would seem to suit more accurate types with the danger that lurks from off the cut-and-prepared, however power has seen the likes of Jason Day, Louis Oosthuzien, Dustin Johnson, Jon Rahm and Bubba Watson contest three of the four finals held here. 2019’s Sunday tussle between Kevin Kisner and Matt Kuchar was much more in keeping with what the course would suggest is the most likely formula to success, however this is Match Play and the unexpected is very much to be expected.
A liking for Bermudagrass greens and Pete Dye tracks is a good starter for this week, however ultimately to progress to Sunday a player is going to need to handle the mental side of Match Play golf first and foremost.
The final point to note is that there’s a major difference between how some bookmakers are playing this week from an each-way perspective. ¼ odds for 4 places is the norm for this event, however 1/5 odds for 8 places is also available from a select few bookmakers, meaning that an each-way return is achieved from a quarter-final finish or better. Slightly lower prices as ever is the trade-off between the options, however it’s certainly worth considering this option if the odds on your selected player(s) is similar enough to justifiy.
My final selections are as follows, all using the 8EW, 1/5 odds option at slightly shorter prices:
WGC Match Play Tips – Featured Bookmaker:
