A new European Tour season brings an exciting new crop of talent. Here, we profile five players who are well placed to make a serious impact on the Race to Dubai in 2019.
Adri Arnaus
In his short career, Arnaus has passed every test put in front of him. After graduating from Texas A&M University in 2016, where he was a teammate of fellow rising star Cameron Champ, the Spaniard set about moving through the ranks of professional golf, joining the satellite Alps Tour the following year.
Although still an amateur, Arnaus immediately showed he was at home in the professional game, playing his way into two play-offs in his first two Alps Tour starts, and while he couldn’t get over the line on either occasion, a first victory was clearly not far away – in his next start he triumphed in the Abruzzo Open.
That remarkable start to the season, coupled with a victory in the season-ending Alps Tour Grand Final, saw Arnaus become the first amateur to win the tour’s Order of Merit.
Having foregone all prize money from that successful season, he finally turned professional at the end of 2017, the Barcelona native embarking on a season on the Challenge Tour where he continued to impress.
Despite successive missed cuts in his opening two events, Arnaus bounced back emphatically. He made 19 cuts in 20 starts while accumulating 15 top 20s, 12 top 15s, eight top tens, six top fives, three podium finishes and, saving his best for last, a win at the season-ending Ras Al Khaimah Challenge Tour Grand Final.
Known for his length off the tee and deft touch around the greens, the 24 year old – who finished 2018 as the Challenge Tour Number Two – is being hotly-tipped to continue his seemingly effortless rise through the golfing ranks.
Victor Perez
In close pursuit of Arnaus all season on the Challenge Tour was Perez. Like Arnaus, Perez also progressed through the Alps Tour, but it then took the Frenchman two seasons to make the grade on the Challenge Tour.
His 2017 campaign featured a win on the developmental but ultimately saw his bid for promotion to the European Tour fall short with an 18th place finish in the Rankings, and so the Frenchman returned to the Challenge Tour in 2018 with unfinished business.
The new year began unceremoniously with three missed cuts in his first six starts, but it was a remarkable stretch in the business end of the season which saw the 26 year old fly up the Rankings.
Over the span of eight events from August to November, Perez came no lower than tied 15th, finishing inside the top five on four occasions and winning once, with a stroke average of 68.4 during that purple patch.
Following that red-hot run, Perez immediately made his mark on the European Tour, carding rounds of 71-65-66-67 to claim a share of third at the Honma Hong Kong Open presented by Amundi.
After such a strong start to life as a European Tour Member, Perez is all set to thrive in his rookie campaign.
Sean Crocker
Sporting pedigree runs in the Crocker family, and on the back of an excellent first year as a professional, it looks as though the young American is his family’s latest star.
With his father Gary previously an international cricketer for Zimbabwe, Crocker knows first-hand what it takes to rise to the top of one’s chosen sport, and he took his first step towards the summit of world golf this year, by earning a debut season on the European Tour via the Challenge Tour.
In 2018, Crocker showed signs he can already compete at the highest level – finishing inside the top five at the ISPS Handa World Super 6 Perth, and inside the top ten at the Australian PGA Championship, while also qualifying for The Open Championship at Carnoustie.
But it was on the second tier Challenge Tour where the University of Southern California graduate cut his teeth, finishing in 11thplace in the Rankings despite playing only 11 events – the second fewest of any of the top 15 players who graduated to the European Tour.
In the 2019 season-opener in Hong Kong, Crocker played a practice round with Patrick Reed and ate lunch with Tommy Fleetwood – the sort of company we expect him to be keeping from now on.
Jack Singh Brar
Another player to have made a big impact during his first season as a professional in 2018 was Singh Brar.
The Englishman, who joined the paid ranks after representing Great Britain and Ireland in the 2017 Walker Cup, made a very fast start to life as a professional, winning on the Alps Tour on his third pro start before finishing as a runner-up on his Challenge Tour debut in Turkey in April.
Singh Brar showed maturity beyond his 21 years throughout the rest of his debut Challenge Tour season, proving to be remarkably consistent by finishing the season with one win, six top tens and the Tour’s third-best stroke average, 69.5.
The youngest player to graduate from the Challenge Tour to the European Tour in 2018, don’t be surprised to see Singh Brar make a name for himself on Europe’s top tier in 2019.
Romain Langasque
Although still only 23 years old, Langasque has been through a lot in his short career.
Having won The Amateur Championship in 2015, the Frenchman burst onto the world golfing scene in 2016 when he enjoyed a memorable Masters Tournament debut – after making the cut, he shot 31 in his final nine holes at Augusta to tie the record for the lowest back nine score by an amateur in Masters history.
Langasque joined the paid ranks soon after and graduated to the European Tour via the Challenge Tour that very same year, but following a disappointing debut season in 2017, he was back to square one in 2018.
After a first win as a professional on home soil at the Hopps Open de Provence in September, Langasque was firmly in contention to graduate from the Challenge Tour for a second time, but despite a valiant effort in the season-ending Ras Al Khaimah Challenge Tour Grand Final – where he came fourth – he would miss out on a place inside the top 15.
Undeterred by this setback, Langasque went straight to Qualifying School Final Stage, coming through six gruelling rounds to regain his European Tour card.
Since then Langasque has made three cuts in three starts, finishing no lower than tied 23rdwhile also claiming outright second at the South African Open hosted by the City of Johannesburg – his best result on the European Tour.
Now older and wiser, expect to see Langasque fulfil his potential in the near future.
