Ben Coley's golf betting tips: ISPS Handa Championship preview and best bets

Golf betting tips: ISPS Handa Championship

1.5pts e.w. Keita Nakajima at 40/1 (BoyleSports 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

1.5pts e.w. Takumi Kanaya at 45/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

1pt e.w. Kalle Samooja at 90/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

1pt e.w. Sebastian Soderberg at 100/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

1pt e.w. Yuta Katsuragawa at 100/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

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The DP World Tour has been away for a month and as if to smooth its return, even as we venture from South Africa to its first ever co-sanctioned event in Japan, we are again heading to a golf course designed by Jack Nicklaus.

In a statement which makes fellow playing legend Gary Player seem a paragon of humility, Nicklaus states that Ishioka Golf Club is "the best golf course I know of in Japan", like a pub landlord who says the best pint he's tasted is one he poured.

Not five weeks have passed since we heard from Nicklaus that St Francis Links is "perhaps the best course I've seen" and you won't need me to tell you who designed that one, either. Let's just say he's very proud of his own work, or that of his firm at least, and I suppose you have to admire that.

Pride will certainly be pulsing through the veins of the many Japanese players who get to test themselves in this good-ish field, one which features potential Ryder Cup players plus Lucas Herbert and Christiaan Bezuidenhout, each competitive in much better company over on the PGA Tour of late.

Generally, co-sanctioned events are dominated by the raiding party, and that may prove to be the case here. That said I think the Japan Tour is strong and we've seen as much already this season, with Kazuki Higa, Rikuya Hoshino and Ryo Hisatsune all having contended at various points, all while learning the ropes.

With home-field advantage, plus the fact that many of the visitors haven't played in four weeks or more, this is a much better opportunity that its PGA Tour cousin, the ZOZO Championship, in which the Japanese players have for the most part been outclassed.

As for the course, it doesn't necessarily carry the hallmarks of a typical Nicklaus layout. Yes, you can see every green from every tee, or so they say, but the undulations, dramatic bunkering and heavily contoured greens we're used to are not obviously apparent. Nor is the trademark Nicklaus width off the tee, with Ishioka reasonably narrow for all that it will be artificially widened by playing softer than ideal.

Short on the scorecard and with two reachable par-fives, it's been a bit of a pushover on the Japan Tour, and that suggests low scoring will be the order of the day. Five of the last six winners here led the field in greens hit, most of them pounded fairways, and I would think the winner will have peppered flags all week and made a decent amount of putts. No, that's not a particularly bold prediction.

Of the market leaders, Bezuidenhout looks a nice fit but does have to fly in from South Carolina. I still think he ought to be favourite over Rasmus Hojgaard, last seen in the first week of February and with fitness doubts still lingering, but that's a declaration that the Dane is a bit short, rather than 20/1 Bezuidenhout being enough to risk the jet lag factor.

Instead, I'll make the case for backing two of the most promising players in Japan, KEITA NAKAJIMA and TAKUMI KANAYA.

• CLICK HERE to back Nakajima with Sky Bet

With Higa cut from an opening 70 and Hoshino closing in on Bezuidenhout towards the top of the betting, it's these two formerly top-ranked amateurs who look the pick of the prices and victory for either of them would be no surprise whatsoever.

Starting with Nakajima, his last three starts on home soil have all been top-10 finishes, his worst round 70, and he has some valuable and impressive course experience having been the halfway leader when ultimately fifth here back in October.

We've got some reliable strokes-gained data to assess, too, and it tells us that he was among the best ball-strikers in a world-class field at Riviera in February. He'd hit the ball to a similar standard when making the cut in the Sony Open and but for the putter he might've been in the mix at a far higher level than this one.

He'd managed that a year earlier in the Sony Open, contending at the halfway point in a tournament won by his idol Hideki Matsuyama, while fifth place in the Australian Open when still an amateur helps form a really strong set of results when rubbing shoulders with elite players.

Nakajima has also done that in the ZOZO Championship, finishing 28th and 12th in tournaments won by Matsuyama and Keegan Bradley. That experience puts him at an advantage over a number of his compatriots; it also proves he's up to competing at this level.

This will be his first DP World Tour start outside of the Open but already we know he's good enough and with home advantage in his favour, 40/1 looks well worth taking about a player who ranks second in GIR and is accurate enough off the tee.

Kanaya's recent form is even stronger, having won an International Series event on the Asian Tour back in February. Last week he was the 54-hole leader in another of them, this time in Vietnam, and like Katajima that gives him a competitive edge that a number of the leading European players simply don't have.

• CLICK HERE to back Kanaya with Sky Bet

First-round leader on his way to eighth place in Japan before that, his other results in 2023 show 35th in a high-class Saudi International, and 28th in the Thailand Classic, his one start at DP World Tour level since ending last year with finishes of seventh and 24th in Australia.

One of the most accurate drivers around, Kanaya should take to Ishioka and while there's a slight question mark regarding low-scoring conditions, his putter has been red-hot of late.

Unlike Nakajima, he's played in a handful of DP World Tour events already and his performances in Dubai (ninth), Abu Dhabi (contended at halfway) and Germany (17th) suggest that this weaker field combined with home advantage should make him a live player.

Kanaya's record in Japan shows 22 top-10s in his last 31 starts, three of them wins, and he's impossible to ignore.

Q-School graduate Hisatsune is more appealing at 60/1 than Taiga Semikawa is at 33s and 40s, with the latter just having to bring his exceptional Japan Tour form with him to a co-sanctioned event. Until he shows that he can do so, taking relatively short prices will make limited appeal.

That's something YUTO KATSURAGAWA also has to prove but I can't resist this course winner at 100/1 in places.

• CLICK HERE to back Katsuragawa with Sky Bet

The reason for such odds about another of Japan's most promising young golfers is a string of missed cuts on the Korn Ferry Tour, but the last three having all been by a single shot, latterly following a good start, and I wouldn't judge him too harshly on that.

Katsuragawa earned conditional status by making the cut at Q-School last year and it was always going to be a big gear change for a player who has only been professional for two years and hadn't ventured outside of Asia until last summer's Open Championship.

No wonder he's been slow to adapt, but Katsuragawa did manage 19th place in Colombia in February and is clearly playing better than his form figures suggest.

With that in mind, it's best to focus on the fact that he won his first Japan Tour title at this course last April, shooting weekend 65s after a second-round 63. He'd also played a three-round event here at a lower level, when not in particularly good form, and again finished fast for seventh place.

First in greens hit on the Japan Tour last year and seventh in fairways, he's the sort of accurate type I'm looking for and he makes birdies for fun, having also ranked fourth in scoring and seventh in birdies-or-better.

Had this event taken place in November, I'm convinced he'd have been half the price. Perhaps, like so many Europeans who've returned from a poor run on the PGA Tour to contend immediately when back closer to home, Katsuragawa can benefit more than anyone for being in Japan again.

As you can tell I expect a really strong home challenge and the likes of Shugo Imahira, Aguri Iwasaki and Riki Kawamoto all have to be considered. The latter was a very good amateur and hits the ball a mile, so while I'm not sure that asset is all that valuable here, he has an explosive quality which will appeal to some at three-figure prices.

Flying Finn primed for Asia return

Moving on to the DP World Tour regulars and it's undeniably hard to get a firm handle on them given this first venture to Japan, the course, and the break.

I suspect it'll suit players like Alex Bjork and Joost Luiten more than say Antoine Rozner, whose best club is driver when he's firing, and Bjork did make some appeal based on his previous win in China and the fact that he's best supported when accuracy trumps power.

However, he's got a two-month break to overcome so I'll chance two at much bigger prices, starting with KALLE SAMOOJA.

• CLICK HERE to back Samooja with Sky Bet

Part of the appeal is that the Finn does have some experience in Japan, having taken part in the Olympics. Not only that, he actually began his career as a touring professional on the Asian Tour, which perhaps explains why his Challenge Tour breakthrough came in China.

Among his best efforts prior to a first DP World Tour win in Germany last year was second place after a three-week break at a new course in Cyprus and he's since added some Nicklaus form at the London Club, but this narrow, tree-lined test might suit him even more.

Samooja has been second at Crans, third at Muthaiga on his first start in three months and sixth at Karen, all short and narrow, and I'm keen to mark up his effort on an altogether different course last time out. There, Samooja sat fourth at halfway before the bombers, like winner Nick Bachem, powered clear.

He'll find this much more to his liking and while strokes-gained data for these low-grade tournaments has been indicative rather than precise, his is encouraging – a typically good putter in fact struggling with that club, but his driving solid and his trademark approach play really beginning to fire.

While the courses are very different I don't want to dismiss form from South Africa altogether, especially as last year, Pablo Larrazabal won the equivalent event to this one in Spain having picked up where he'd left off with a brace of top-fives a month earlier.

Aaron Cockerill did similar, finishing third, and the Canadian is another who exceeded expectations with a closing 65 for 13th place in the Jonsson Workwear Open.

That came after a fine effort to make the cut despite an opening 77 in the SDC Championship and between them those two results might've kickstarted his season following a trio of narrow, respectable missed cuts in the Middle East and Kenya.

Cockerill relies on his putter but that's probably no bad thing this week and if he's in the form he showed when 13th behind Bachem, he could edge further up the leaderboard at a course I suspect will prove far more suitable.

However, SEBASTIAN SODERBERG is preferred as he seeks to land a deserved second DP World Tour victory.

• CLICK HERE to back Soderberg with Sky Bet

Although prone to wild swings in form, the Swede has been runner-up five times over the past 18 months, including on his seasonal return in Abu Dhabi when a tad unfortunate to be beaten by Victor Perez.

Fifth at the Nedbank towards the end of last season, one which included another luckless second to Thorbjorn Olesen at the Belfry, helps underline the progress he's made and a win at this kind of level is well within his capabilities.

Soderberg's first came at Crans, which made sense given that he'd already triumphed at Karen on the Challenge Tour, while second place at Valderrama is another hint that this tree-lined test might appeal to him.

The fact that he spends large amounts of his practise time at Black Mountain in Thailand is another potential source of encouragement in terms of his readiness, but above all else his ceiling makes him one to be interested in under the right conditions in an event where the two class acts arrive on flights from the USA.

Posted at 1845 BST on 17/04/23

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