Alfred Dunhill Championship: Steve Palmer's final-round preview, best bets

When to watch

Sky Sports Golf, 9.30am Sunday

Best bets

Pablo Larrazabal to win the Alfred Dunhill Championship
3pts 8-11 BoyleSports

Pablo Larrazabal-Branden Grace dual forecast
2pts 13-8 Sky Bet

Story so far

Ante-post 55-1 chance Pablo Larrazabal leads the Alfred Dunhill Championship by three shots going into the final round and the Spaniard is a general 4-6 with 18 holes to play.

Pre-tournament favourite, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, missed the halfway cut by four shots, and Branden Grace has emerged as the South African to lay down the strongest challenge at Leopard Creek, Malelane.

Grace is alone in third place, four shots off the pace, with European Tour maiden Wil Besseling a shot better off in second spot. Four-time Alfred Dunhill champion, Charl Schwartzel, has made an excellent comeback from a seven-month injury lay-off and is tied for sixth place.

The final twoball of Larrazabal and Besseling is due on the tee at 11.55am local time (9.55am UK and Ireland) on Sunday.

Leaderboard
-11 Pablo Larrazabal
-8 Wil Besseling
-7 Branden Grace
-5 Marcus Armitage, Zander Lombard
-4 Adrian Otaegui, Charl Schwartzel, MJ Viljoen, Joel Sjoholm

Best prices
8-11 P Larrazabal, 9-2 B Grace, 13-2 W Besseling, 16 Z Lombard, 22 C Schwartzel, 40 M Armitage, 50 A Otaegui, 80 J Sjoholm, 100 bar

Final-round preview

Pablo Larrazabal is one of few players in the Alfred Dunhill field who has spurned the chance to wear shorts this week and the four-time European Tour champion looks set to be rewarded for his professionalism by lifting the trophy.

Tournament organisers decided to allow players to compete in shorts this week due to temperatures nudging up to 40 C, but Larrazabal stuck with standard Tour dress and has played the best golf of anyone. A cooler afternoon is forecast for Sunday and the leader can be fancied to successfully defend his three-shot advantage.

Larrazabal is a quirky character who rarely gives the impression of being entirely in control of proceedings, but he has won some prestigious titles and beaten quality final-round opposition in the process – the French Open against Colin Montgomerie, the BMW International – twice – against Sergio Garcia and Henrik Stenson, and the Abu Dhabi Championship, edging Rory McIlroy and Phil Mickelson by a shot.

In comparison, an Alfred Dunhill Championship playing alongside a Tour maiden in the final twoball, will seem like a piece of cake.

If Larrazabal can stay away from the water hazard at the seventh hole, where he has dropped three shots this week, then the title seems likely to be his. Surely he will aim much further left off the tee this time if he is still leading at the seventh on Sunday.

The leader has been staying with the owner of Leopard Creek this week and will be a welcome champion, even though he is not a South African. Larrazabal is friends with Johann Rupert, who until recently was South Africa's richest man, and the pair could well be toasting victory together after another 18 holes of action.

Branden Grace has endured a miserable year by his standards and his confidence has taken a hit. His weak approach to the final hole of round three – an iron into the water short of the green – summed up his season. Leopard Creek is the sort of track where scoring can be volatile and Grace will certainly feel he is still well in the hunt, but that 18th-hole blunder means a deficit of four shots which is probably too much to overcome.

Grace is tenacious enough to finish runner-up – and will battle all the way in his homeland – but Larrazabal has looked cool and composed for the most part this week and appears ready to finish the job at a course he loves.

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