Golf betting tips: Arnold Palmer Invitational

3pts e.w. Tommy Fleetwood at 25/1 (Betfred 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

2pts e.w. Shane Lowry at 35/1 (bet365, Betfred 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)

1pt e.w. Keegan Bradley at 55/1 (Sky Bet, Unibet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)

1pt e.w. Viktor Hovland at 55/1 (Sky Bet, Unibet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)

1pt e.w. Hovland to lead after R1 at 50/1 (Paddy Power 1/4 1,2,3,4,5)

| |

For some golfers defending titles is a rare privilege, but for Scottie Scheffler it will feel strange not to by the end of 2025. This week's Arnold Palmer Invitational will be the first of seven such opportunities between March and August and it might be the most important as it provides something of a dress rehearsal for the Masters. Scheffler has won both of these tournaments twice, in 2022 and 2024, but couldn't quite defend in-between.

When you're as good as Scheffler, as so few golfers in the entire history of the sport have been, there's not really a golf course that doesn't suit. We saw at Pinehurst and we've seen in Open Championships that anything which does unpredictable things to his most predictable shots is bound to work against him, but if he played the 2024 US Open again this week, he'd be the right favourite, and he's still the right favourite for the Open this summer.

But there are things about both Bay Hill and Augusta National, and Sawgrass for that matter, which make him particularly well-suited to the biggest events of spring. Bay Hill is a stock par 72 on the scorecard, not extraordinarily long by today's standards, but it's a really demanding test of a player's long-game. Thick rough levels the playing field around the greens and it's being able to control those approaches and avoid that randomness which is key, something he does by being both an excellent driver and the single best iron player in the sport.

It comes as no surprise then to state that the outcome of recent renewals has been reasonably simple. When Scheffler has putted well, he has won: first when pipping Viktor Hovland, then when utterly dominating to the extent that it's quite hard to remember who finished second. When he's putted badly he has not won: first finishing 15th when making nothing on debut, then beaten two shots after a bogey at the final hole two years ago.

Whether Scheffler holes his share or not after a good but unspectacular start to 2025, one fly in the ointment could be the weather. There's wind in the forecast for Thursday, rain and thunderstorms at the weekend, and around here things could get ugly. On the flip side, perhaps the most notable feature of this event in recent years has been organisers' desire to push fast greens close to breaking point, something which may become impossible given that there's been rain around in Orlando already.

Softened conditions are never a bad thing for past champion Rory McIlroy, who right now is driving the ball extraordinarily well even by his extraordinary standards. He's on record as saying that he feels conditions have been allowed to get out of hand here so that rain really could enhance his prospects of a third win in six since he spent a month at home tweaking his swing. Should he do it, good luck keeping a lid on Masters expectations.

As you can probably tell, I'm certainly wary of the big two this week, more so than I was at Torrey Pines, and my first inclination was to head to the 'without Scheffler and McIlroy' markets currently offered by Sky Bet and bet365. Ultimately, followers will have to decide what to do based on where they choose or are able to bet and it seems fairest to stick to the main market on balance.

After those two, things get much more open. Collin Morikawa has performed very poorly on his last two starts here and seemingly can't get a handle on these bermuda greens. Ludvig Aberg has been mid-pack twice but largely thanks to his putter (which isn't to say I oppose him with confidence), while Justin Thomas didn't choose to play here regularly before the money compelled him to and I'd worry about his driver misbehaving once or twice too often.

With Xander Schauffele back from injury, all of this is why I am really keen on TOMMY FLEETWOOD and those who are concerned that he hasn't yet won on the PGA Tour may prefer taking a route which could result in a full payout for second or even third place.

I was a little annoyed not to have chanced him despite a lack of Torrey Pines experience when placed last time and we do have to suffer with the price after that top-five performance, but he's far more familiar with Bay Hill and had five good efforts here in six before its status was elevated.

One of those was third place in 2019 when a top-class tee-to-green display arguably ought to have seen him win his first PGA Tour title and who knows where we'd be now had he done so, given that he's still waiting to shake the monkey off his back.

Seeing Thomas Detry do so can only help in that regard and two more maidens have won since to emphasise how slim the margin is between success and perceived failure. Fleetwood certainly hasn't benefited from the sort of bounce which saw Brian Campbell get off the mark two weeks ago.

I make him the most reliable option (not to be confused with most likely winner) in the field outside the front two, with his iron play arguably never better than it is today. All told 11 of his 12 appearances since last summer's Open have been high-class from a tee-to-green perspective and his putter has improved throughout all three starts this year, with his finishing positions reading 21-22-5.

Big, championship courses like this one, where patience is key, are always a plus for Fleetwood and so is the forecast, with that wind if anything likely to help. Indeed the aforementioned 2019 edition, where he produced his best golf here so far, was played in a stiff breeze.

He's a certified fan of the course and he looks great in a cardigan, so maybe this is the week at last.

The forecast and the fact we're in Florida are both also in SHANE LOWRY's favour and again, while it's fair to say he's not won as often as we'd all perhaps like, any such concerns should be in part negated by betting without the big two if you're able to do so.

Lowry's parallels with close friend Fleetwood extend to the fact that he too has been outstanding from tee-to-green for many months now, gaining strokes in all bar one of his 31 measured starts dating back to the beginning of 2024.

That's remarkable consistency even for a player of Lowry's class and having ranked second when finally cracking this course last season, enough for third place overall, he too looks very likely to give his running.

Lowry actually putted fine that week, as he did here in 2023, and his overall Florida record is enormously positive. He said himself that it took time to figure things out here, particularly the bermuda grass, but in 12 starts over the last four years he has nine top-20s, four top-fives, and several close calls. This is his part-time home and it's shown.

We're just a few weeks on from his second place behind McIlroy at Pebble Beach and while never really in the tournament when 11th last week, easier conditions at the Cognizant will not have helped. I imagine he felt pretty deflated to tee off 12 behind following Jake Knapp's opening 59 but come the weekend, his customarily top-class iron play was firing better than anyone else in the field.

That prep run in Florida, something so few in this field have behind them, could work in Lowry's favour and now that he can approach Bay Hill with confidence, his ability to control his ball and grind all day long should serve him well.

Will Zalatoris was on my shortlist but he's been a little iffy off the tee of late and strength in that area is what's helped him to build up a good record in the Arnold Palmer. For each of his previous four visits he's arrived with the driver purring so the fact that it isn't right now is enough of a negative, along with a general sense that there's still something missing with his approach work.

For KEEGAN BRADLEY that something missing is the putter, but there are two reasons to be optimistic.

Firstly, he's putted on bermuda twice this year and they've been his two best performances with that club: 25th and 17th in Hawaii. Secondly, he's gained strokes putting on his last four Bay Hill starts, despite on each occasion arriving here on a run of bad putting, sometimes bordering on hopeless.

If the Ryder Cup captain can again come alive on bermuda, which he's now so well-accustomed to having made his home in Jupiter, then I see no reason why he can't contend at a course he's always loved. Bradley was third in 2013, runner-up a year later, halfway leader in 2019 and, prior to finishing mid-pack last year, had finished 10th, 11th and 10th in the three previous renewals.

Five of his seven PGA Tour wins have been under tough conditions including in a stiff breeze in Texas as a rookie and in this second phase of his career, if we can call it that, two of his three victories have been in Signature and FedEx Cup Playoff events, the latest of them just last August.

Another in the coming weeks and months and suddenly the idea of a playing captain's role at Bethpage will become very serious indeed so perhaps it will suit everyone if he does finish second to Scheffler or McIlroy, something which appears perfectly plausible to my eye, but as stated for the purposes of tracking selections I'm going to recommend the accessible-to-all outright market.

Bradley returned to action following a long post-Presidents Cup break to go 15-6-15 to begin the season and I'm happy to give him the benefit of the doubt following a poor effort at Pebble Beach, after which he was one of the very best ball-strikers in the field at Torrey Pines but had one of those rank putting weeks which he's always been susceptible to.

There's undoubtedly a chance his improved run on these greens comes to a shuddering end but I wouldn't count on it. He's 45/1 with eight places via Sky Bet, Coral and Ladbrokes, 55/1 with six, or 40s in places without the big two.

Hope for Hovland at ideal course

Course debutant Akshay Bhatia stood out as potentially overpriced and while he has next to no form in Florida, he has lived in North Carolina for several years. Indeed there's a Palmer connection as North Carolina is where Arnold Palmer went to college, and after two winning lefties last week I wouldn't be shocked were this star in the making keep that little run going.

Ultimately I can't get past the fact that he's yet to show an aptitude for these conditions and you can say the same for Tony Finau, whose one top-10 finish in 22 Florida starts compares poorly with 13 of them in 44 appearances in California, much closer to his Utah base.

Conditions can make all the difference, especially at this time of year as we transition from west to east, and I can't help but wonder whether they might help spark VIKTOR HOVLAND back into life.

Hovland's struggles are very well documented by now but it should be said he still almost won a major and a FedEx Cup Playoff event last year, one in Kentucky and the other in Tennessee.

He once said he wasn't keen on Florida golf in terms of the visuals and the grasses but eventually overcame that feeling to finish second here in 2022, when a tad unfortunate, and then 10th a year later when a third-round 66 catapulted him into contention.

Last year he was thereabouts in 10th at halfway and Bay Hill makes perfect sense in many ways, as it's a point-and-shoot test of execution where those who lack confidence around the greens are often able to get away with that from thick, hack-out rough when it's short grass that scares players like Hovland.

Of course we have to acknowledge that four appearances so far this year have yielded little in the way of results and it was a tad off-putting to hear him say he felt four rounds at tough courses was still beyond him after a fast start at Pebble Beach. Still, he also said he feels close again and having gained strokes with his ball-striking on his last two starts, maybe he's right.

More work in the interim combined with the move to Bay Hill could've seen bookmakers take a chunk off his price but they've not done so and remembering that his first few weeks of the season were undermined by a freak foot injury sustained over Christmas, I'm inclined to take an undoubted chance on a player who was third favourite a year ago.

Perhaps unlike my first three selections, Hovland is by no means guaranteed to do anything good at any stage soon, but that fast start at Pebble Beach (2nd) combined with a strong record here means I'm inclined to split stakes between the outright (or 'without', if I've not made that clear yet) market and the first-round lead.

This is a bit of a shot in the dark on a player who has been wandering alone there for far too long. Maybe Bay Hill will bring him back into the light.

In contrast to Hovland, Min Woo Lee's silky short-game might not be seen to best effect here but he can do better than he has in the past and is respected along with Wyndham Clark, who went 2-2 over this fortnight last year.

Those two complete the shortlist but Scheffler of course went 1-1 to Clark's 2-2, and the prospect of a hat-trick in this event is dauntingly strong. As ever in these Signature Events, we have to have our eyes open to that.

Posted at 1100 GMT on 04/03/25

Safer gambling

We are committed in our support of safer gambling. Recommended bets are advised to over-18s and we strongly encourage readers to wager only what they can afford to lose.

If you are concerned about your gambling, please call the National Gambling Helpline / on 0808 8020 133.

Further support and information can be found at and .