ROME- Thursday marks the start of the 74th Italian Open. The competition, running until to Sunday, takes place at Golf Club Milano. The Open, part of the PGA European tour, is amongst 10 competitions with the prize pool of 7 million dollars. The winner of the competition stands to win 1,166,660 dollars.

 The competition for the top spot is fierce amongst the 132 competitors who will gather tomorrow from across the world. The top 65 will rank which means that each competitor will have to fight simply to be counted amongst the top half in the 18 rounds played a day. 25 of the top 100 players in the world are amongst the crowd including the winners of 7 Majors: Danny Willett, last year’s winner, Darren Clarke, Graeme McDowell, José Maria Olabazal, Martin Kaymer who is the current Masters champion, Sergio Garcia, and Trevor Immelman.

 Francesco Molinari, winner of the 2016 Italian Open, and his brother, Edoardo, the first European winner of the U.S. Amateur Championship in 96 years in 2005, will be in the formidable team of 13 players. Francesco is ranked 8 and will captain the team, Edoardo is ranked 61.

 Eduordo and Francesco have become Italy’s unofficial ambassadors of golf in recent years, their skill and constructive competition have fostered a warming bond that was displayed in 2010 when they became the first brothers in 47 years to be in the same Ryder Cup team.

 Francesco has stiff competition from the 7 outranking him amongst which there are the Brits Rory McIlroy, outranking Francesco by one place, and Tommy Fleetwood, the current favourite to win. 

KVH