State Farm Classic

[Stanley]

Outright plays (1.5pts):

Karen Stupples to win 25/1 e.w. @ SkyBet
Missed the cut last week after a two-week break, but confident of a return to her previous form this week - form that resulted in top-4 finishes in each of her last four events, including a win at the Women's British Open. And with a good history on this course - four top-15 finishes in five visits - she will be looking to move up from her current 6th place on the Tour's Money List and Scoring Average lists.

Laura Davies to win 25/1 e.w. @ Stan James
Davies ranks just behind Stupples in scoring average this year and has shown similar form recently in her last four events on the Ladies European Tour. A win this week will edge closer to a Hall of Fame selection and her course history suggests that she will come very close this week. She has played in this event six times and has finished in top-4 five times. She has been runner-up on three occasions, twice via a playoff, but never won this title. This course owes Davies a win!

Laura Diaz to win 30/1 e.w. @ Centrebet
Diaz has shown a marked improvement in form over the past six weeks and should not be at these odds. Although she finished in 4th place in the three-day event, the Giant Eagle Classic, last month, she has gone backwards in the final round in the four events since. From positions of 4th, 2nd, 12th and 10th, she has finished 13th, 10th, 22nd and 13th respectively. She is too good a player for this to continue and having already finished 5th on this course, she should at least get herself into contention again. And maybe the weather will cancel the last round!

[Stanley]

Matchup plays (1.5pts unless stated):

Christina Kim to beat Marcy Hart -114 @ Expekt
Siding with the player who has a 8-3-1 h2h lead in 2004. Both has shown good form recently with top-10 finishes last week, but Hart has a best finish of 60th in three attempts around The Rail course. Admittedly, Kim did miss the cut last year but it was her debut on the course and she was in poor form at the time. It is much more serious to repeatedly struggle on this course, so Kim should extend her head-to-head lead this week.

Cristie Kerr to beat Suzann Pettersen -111 @ Stan James [3pts]
Kerr may have missed the cut in her last two events, but it was because of some poor putting rather than a weak overall game. She hit 67% of greens in both the Wachovia LPGA Championship and the Wendy's Championship for Children and a cold putter is much easier to turn around than swing faults, particularly for a player who has won twice this year already. Top-25 finishes in each of her last five visits also suggest that Kerr should be back on the leaderboards this week and if so, she is a different class of player to Pettersen.

Gloria Park to beat Suzann Pettersen +115 @ Five Dimes
Just don't see why Park is such a large underdog. In their last eleven common starts, she holds a 8-2-1 h2h lead over the Norwegian - and 3-0-1 in their last four meetings - and finished 26 places ahead of her last year. The consistent Park hasn't finished outside the top-40 in any of her last 15 starts; in Pettersen's last 15 starts, she has missed the cut on six occasions.

[Stanley]

Outrights - FINAL RESULT: 0-3; -4.50pts

Stupples 21st
Davies 24th
Diaz 11th

Diaz finished best-placed and three shots out of a place finish, but all were a very long way behind Cristie Kerr and Christina Kim in some of the lowest scoring on this Tour for many years.

Matchups - FINAL RESULT: 2-1-0; +3.00pts

Kim/Hart WON by 11
Kerr/Pettersen WON by 10
Park/Pettersen LOST by 7

Managed to offset some poor outright plays with the matchups again on this Tour. The two winning selections dominated this event, so good to win something with them this week.