Jon Rahm lurking dangerously over the shoulder of Stateside maiden

Sky Sports Golf red button, 5pm Saturday

Matthew Fitzpatrick leads the WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational by two shots at the halfway stage, the ante-post 80-1 chance shortening to a general 9-2 with 36 holes to play.

Fitzpatrick, a five-time champion on the European Tour, has never won on the US Tour, but he came close in the Arnold Palmer Invitational in March, finishing runner-up to Francesco Molinari. The sweet-swinging 24-year-old Englishman recruited Billy Foster as caddie at the start of the season and the two northerners have combined well.

Fitzpatrick has finished runner-up three times in the last eight months, with near-misses in the Hong Kong Open and the BMW International on the European Tour, and he will be desperate to follow 20th place in the Open last week with a Stateside breakthrough.

The task ahead is immense, though, with world-class talent lurking just behind Fitzpatrick on the TPC Southwind leaderboard. Jon Rahm, Patrick Cantlay, Billy Horschel and Cameron Smith share second place, just two shots off the pace, while Brooks Koepka and Justin Rose are only four shots adrift and well capable of making their presence felt over the weekend.

Pre-tournament favourite Dustin Johnson is tied for 22nd place, seven shots behind Fitzpatrick, but Rory McIlroy, second in the ante-post betting, is tied for 13th spot, with a five-shot deficit, and still in the hunt for the Memphis glory.

Two sunny, calm days are forecast for the remainder of the event, so scoring should remain low, although the greens are drying out and need to be approached from the fairway. Rahm and Cantlay are Southwind debutants who have made excellent starts and are greatly respected, but Racing Post Sport pre-tournament selections Koepka, Horschel and Webb Simpson are all in contention, so there is no urge for any further outright investments at this stage.

Third-round twoball punters are pointed towards Rahm, who is much more comfortable in the latter weekend pairings of US Tour events than Saturday playing partner Cameron Smith, a Stateside maiden. The Spaniard can boss the 6.40pm UK and Ireland time contest.

A similar argument can be made for Horschel in his 6.30pm match against Shugo Imahira, while world number one Koepka should be too solid for Bubba Watson in the 6pm duel. The Rahm, Horschel, Koepka twoballs treble is attractive.

Twoballs recommendation
J Rahm (3-5), B Horschel (8-11) & B Koepka (11-20)
2pts treble Coral, Ladbrokes

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