European Tour tips: Qatar Masters betting preview from Ben Coley

Recommended bets

2pts e.w. Tom Lewis at 28/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)

1pt e.w. Romain Langasque at 66/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)

1pt e.w. Zander Lombard at 80/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7)

1pt e.w. Erik van Rooyen at 90/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)

1pt e.w. Hideto Tanihara at 125/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7)

The Commercial Bank Qatar Masters has undoubtedly suffered for being pushed down the order, once the second leg of the season-opening Middle East swing but now cut adrift in March, at a time when the elite players who once might have added it to their schedules are focused solely on events in the USA.

To underscore the point, look at recent winners. Branden Grace hasn't played here since landing the second of back-to-back titles in 2016, his predecessor Sergio Garcia won't play here again unless it moves back to January and Eddie Pepperell isn't able to defend, with preparations ongoing for his debut in next week's PLAYERS Championship.

I find this job easier when the best players aren't on show so there's no complaining on that score, but it's a shame long-term that one of the most solid albeit curious form guides to the Open Championship will presumably be rendered less significant. There just may not be all that many here who make it all the way to Portrush in July.

From this tournament's very beginnings, it has been clear that to succeed in Doha, on a par 72 which does favour big hitters to some degree, it helps to have built a strong links pedigree. It's not that the turf runs hard and fast, but that the wind - of which plenty is forecast this week - helps conjure leaderboards which, if you took away the title, many would presume had been made in Scotland.

Last year, Pepperell went from winning this to finishing sixth at Carnoustie; had he won the Open with that famous hangover, he'd have succeeded Paul Lawrie in completing the very same double back in 1999. Ernie Els and Henrik Stenson have also won both, and one shot here or there might've enabled us to add Thomas Bjorn, Adam Scott and Garcia to the list.

Grace fired the first ever major 62 in the 2017 Open Championship, where he finished sixth, and his sole PGA Tour success came by the coast. He's a Dunhill Links winner, too - just like Lawrie and 2010 Qatar winner Robert Karlsson, as well as 2002 runner-up Nick Dougherty. Links, coast, wind - it's all relevant to Doha.

Then there's Chris Wood, placed in the Open as an amateur and again as a professional. When his European Tour breakthrough came, little wonder it was here, that glorious six-iron to 15 feet setting up a killer eagle which cost Garcia and George Coetzee the chance of a play-off.

Speaking of Garcia, he won a play-off between two former winners of the Amateur Championship when he got the better of Mikko Ilonen here. Tenuous this may seem but consider too that Rolf Mutz, who won in Doha at the turn of the century in a particularly brutal renewal, also won the Amateur, like Garcia at Muirfield, and that his next best finish on the European Tour came in Scotland, too.

The message is that following Qatar contenders in July is a winning policy, but we can also apply the logic in a slightly different order; that is to say, with particularly strong winds forecast this week, it could well pay to search not in Dubai or Abu Dhabi for the winner, but in Scotland, or even Sicily, wherever the wind has blown.

I add Sicily there as two winners of the remodelled Rocco Forte Open boast Qatar form of the highest order: Alvaro Quiros has a win and two runner-up finishes here, while Joakim Lagergren's victory came after he'd lost a play-off to Jeunghun Wang. For good measure, the Korean had won in Mauritius, by the coast, a year earlier.

If you're feeling a little tied up in knots here, I understand, but the above serves as the foundation for the following five selections, starting with Tom Lewis.

Here we have a player who ticks those links boxes, courtesy not only of his headline-making run as an amateur in 2011, but also a storming-home third in the Dunhill Links a few years later. Lewis might not have won the Amateur Championship, but he did win the Boys Amateur, beating Pepperell in the final.

Also a winner of the St Andrews Trophy, he's long been at home when the wind blows even if his amateur exploits largely confirm that he was simply an outstanding talent in the making.

Having put up Lewis as recently as Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, where he finished ninth, and again in Dubai a week later, I won't re-tell the story of Lewis's rise, demise and rise again, but it's safe to say I don't believe his form over the last ninth months or so to be some kind of extended Indian summer.

On the contrary I believe he's ready to go on and fulfil that enormous potential and add to two wins in Portugal, and it's simply a question of whether we're best to judge him on a couple of low-key efforts when last seen or a run of form prior to that which included three top-10 finishes in four Middle East starts.

Clearly, he was disappointing in Perth but that was his first trip to Australia in some time and the unique format there lends itself to the odd surprise. From there he flew to Mexico for his first WGC appearance since 2012 and I really don't find a quiet week at all difficult to forgive given the travel and fiddly, high-in-the-sky golf course.

Having been in excellent shape before that, played well in both appearances in Sicily and contended until halfway here in 2014, there's enough encouragement to forgive a difficult globe-trotting fortnight and, in a weak field, 28/1 makes plenty of appeal.

Lewis is only just ahead of Fabrizio Zanotti and Jorge Campillo in the market and while last week's windswept Oman Open could serve as an ideal way to prepare for this, there's no substitute for class. Lewis has that in abundance.

Thomas Pieters will doubtless go well and this, again, could be the week, while Jordan Smith finished well for another good Middle East performance on Sunday, but the only other player I really considered towards the head of the betting was Victor Dubuisson.

Ninth in all three previous starts here and with Dunhill Links form in the book, the Frenchman makes some appeal having made a nice return to professional golf. His two wins in Turkey mark him down as a horses-for-courses type and I wouldn't want to put anyone off.

However, at twice the price I'm siding with his protege, Romain Langasque.

He won the aforementioned Amateur Championship and was 10th through 54 holes here on his debut during what ultimately proved to be a disappointing rookie campaign.

Already, he's shown that his second crack at the European Tour will be much more lucrative and while somewhat quiet of late, the fact he's kept on making cuts is a huge positive.

Langasque has been driving the ball really well for a while, always a good starting point when the wind does pick up, and with his short-game razor sharp he has a similar profile to many previous winners of this event.

It's a huge positive that his mentor, Dubuisson, is back on the circuit and I'm sure we'll see both continue to thrive in the weeks and months ahead - potentially starting here.

Back to that Rocco Forte Open form and Zander Lombard has to be of interest.

He ranked 10th for greens hit in Oman last week to extend a run of solid play which dates back to European Tour Qualifying School, where he shared medalist honours with the vastly more experienced Alejandro Canizares, who was also playing on home soil.

With dual subsequent winner Kurt Kitayama close behind, Lombard is entitled to feel like his turn is closer and he's been third and second in a handful of starts since. Both were back home in South Africa, but he's done enough to suggest that when the win does come, it could be further afield.

Last summer, Lombard finished sixth in the Irish Open before playing nicely enough at Carnoustie, and this former Amateur Championship runner-up went so close to breaking his duck when losing a play-off to Quiros in Sicily.

His last start in the Middle East resulted in 18th place behind Dustin Johnson in a considerably stronger field and, at around the 80/1 mark, I'm perfectly happy to take on board the risks attached to backing a serious talent who can be wayward at times.

We saw as much last year, when Lombard opened with a round of 76 here, but the hope is he can take plenty from a second-round 65 which saw him close out with seven birdies in 10 holes and miss the cut by only one.

No less interesting in an event which has been kind to South Africans - see not only Grace and Coetzee but also Jaco Van Zyl, Thomas Aiken and Darren Fichardt - is Erik van Rooyen.

He enjoyed a fine rookie campaign on the European Tour which included some excellent links form, as he followed fourth place in the Irish Open with 17th in the Open Championship.

Van Rooyen also has 11th in the KLM Open to underline his comfort levels in the wind, with 20th at Wentworth, fifth in Denmark and seventh in the Trophee Hassan equally compelling, and this is the right sort of grade for his first win.

Last time out he finished 36th in the WGC-Mexico, an excellent effort which represented a step up on a quiet enough start to the year, and it's worth remembering that he was second at halfway in this event on debut before bombing out over the weekend.

One year on and with all these new experiences and accomplishments behind him, this confirmed links lover could go really well in Qatar.

Others to mention have to include Ashley Chesters and Peter Hanson, both eye-catching last week. Hanson was runner-up to Lawrie in the shortened 2012 renewal of this event, played in a gale, and his return to form therefore comes at just the right time.

Oliver Wilson has the requisite Dunhill Links form and was fifth and 12th here once upon a time, both Matt Southgate and Paul Waring will relish the forecast breeze, and watch out too for young No Laying Up representative, Charlie Saxon.

Here we have a good college golfer who has taken a creative path as a professional, winning seven times over the last three years, from China to Peru, as he seeks to join his former sparring partners - which include Wyndham Clark - on the PGA Tour.

Anyone who can pick up events with the frequency he has, even at a fairly lowly level, is entitled to respect and we ought to remember than Sean Crocker, playing on an invite, went very well here for 54 holes last year.

With Kitayama winning again and Clark contending over at the Honda, there's plenty of encouragement for Saxon to work with and he's played nicely on the Web.com Tour so far this year, contending once and bagging a top-20 finish last time when only getting into the field 20 minutes before teeing off.

He's a player to watch but, while he is from Oklahoma, this week's breeze might prove too much, too soon, and I'll finish instead with Hideto Tanihara.

Here we have a player who has finished fifth in an Open Championship won by Tiger Woods and who, since reigniting his career, has been 10th in the Irish Open and third behind Wood and Ashun Wu in the KLM Open.

Those are strong form ties with this event and he was 28th on his Qatar debut last year, making just five bogeys all week but lapped on a quiet Sunday having been ninth heading into the final round.

Fifth in the European Open and sixth in Switzerland confirm that Tanihara has been a fairly frequent contender on the European Tour and he was seventh at halfway and with a round to go last week before a costly finish.

Going back to his Qatar debut, ranking fourth for fairways and greens and sixth in the all-around suggests an immediate affinity for the course and three-figure prices are too tempting to resist.

Posted at 1840 GMT on 04/03/19.