Matthieu Pavon

Plays his first Open since 2017 after a maiden DP World Tour victory in October’s Spanish Open – his 185th event on the circuit - and three other late-season top 10 finishes helped him finish a best-ever 15th on the Race to Dubai rankings and with it earn a card for this year’s PGA Tour.

Then, in only his third event as a member there, a final-hole birdie gave him a one-stroke victory over Nicolai Hojgaard at the Farmers Insurance Open in California.

A week later he was third in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-am and his fifth place at the recent US Open lifted him to 20th in the world only seven months after he was not even in the leading 100.

Pavon’s Open debut seven years ago came courtesy of a third-place finish at the previous week’s Scottish Open, having graduated from the second-tier Challenge circuit the season before.

The son of former French professional footballer Michel Pavon, he qualified for the 2018 US Open and came a fine joint-25th. In 2022, he was runner-up to Jon Rahm at the Spanish Open and on his return to Club de Campo in Madrid he posted a 23-under-par total to beat Zander Lombard by four.