It’s been a week of looking forward in the Italian Open, with the Ryder Cup on everyone’s mind, yet it’s the previous European host nation which dominates the top of the leaderboard.

French duo Julien Guerrier and Romain Langasque will feature in the final group and with Adrian Meronk on their tails, it does appear likely that whoever succeeds Robert MacIntyre as champion in Rome will at least be eligible for selection come September.

For Meronk it may well be that winning here plays a key role in booking his ticket and Langasque should harbour realistic ambitions too, whereas Guerrier has a clearer and more immediate goal: get that monkey off his back.

Guerrier is approaching the 200 mark in terms of DP World Tour starts and hasn’t yet managed to do what he did twice during a fine Challenge Tour campaign in 2017 and win. Nor has he so much as held on to second place.

As you might expect, the market favours those two players with a touch of class who’ve managed to get the job done before, and so would I – yet, gladly on this occasion, there’s a complicating factor. Both Meronk and Langasque made my pre-tournament selections at 20/1 and 66/1 respectively.

Langasque can back up course record

Of the two, I’d narrowly favour Langasque at the prices and if you’re looking for a bet without having had one so far, he would be the recommendation.

Langasque will have to back up a course-record round and some will have that down as a negative, but it’s rarely something I worry about. I’d be much more inclined to draw the positives from probably the best ball-striking day of his career; it’s not as if he couldn’t have squeezed any more out of it, either, having missed four genuine birdie chances.

A tough course which demands a lot of drivers is ideal, as he’d shown before when winning at another Ryder Cup course in Wales, and he’s been coming to the boil lately. Expect him to go really close.

Meronk stalled a little during the back-nine in round three and hasn’t looked totally convincing on the greens, but the rest of his game is in impeccable shape and I certainly wouldn’t look to dissuade anyone from backing him, especially after a fabulous finish with birdies at the 16th and 18th.

When speaking of winning experience, he’s the one who has gathered it most recently, beating players of the calibre of Adam Scott and Ryan Fox. Both were for national opens, too, so this would be an apt hat-trick, one which would certainly go a long way towards yet more history for the Polish pioneer.

Saturday’s set-up played to both his and Langasque’s strengths and something similar is anticipated, so to be frank I’ll be disappointed if we’re not on the winner already. It would be a surprise if both of them failed to sparkle, just as it would be frustrating to see Guerrier do something he’s yet to do.

Saver makes sense

All this being said, a saver on Guerrier feels necessary. He played beautifully for most of round three and is the sort of strong driver with correlating course form in Portugal and Al Hamra that I was looking for pre-tournament. He can be excellent on the greens, too, and his often humdrum approach play has been anything but.

Unlike Matthieu Pavon, who fought so hard to get back into second and then took six at the driveable par-four, Guerrier has winning Challenge Tour form and he didn’t do all that much wrong when leading at this level on two previous occasions. It’s not beyond him to bang down the door at the age of 37.

There are others within striking distance, including Pavon, Marcel Siem and the dangerous Daniel van Tonder who, like Tapio Pulkkanen, can look shaky on the greens but has an awesome long-game when firing. Both these two are built for Marco Simone so it’s not a surprise to see them in the mix having been on the fringes here previously.

The rest are six back or more so if you’re looking for something at a bigger price, van Tonder could be the one. He’s a DP World Tour winner whose abundant power means eagle opportunities ought to be forthcoming at some stage.

If all this feels like dancing around the subject, that’s the nature of reassessment in this kind of situation. My conclusion is neither stick nor twist; place money should be all but guaranteed and spreading a little of it to ensure the top three are all covered is my preferred option.

That Guerrier has a fellow Frenchman alongside him can only be seen as a small positive so while it’s more likely that we get the result we really want, ‘we’ being those who followed Monday’s advice, adding the 54-hole leader at 3/1 isn’t an especially difficult decision.

Posted at 1700 BST on 06/05/23

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