The RyDov Cup, where the Tour began all those years ago, has staked its claim as both the marquee event of the year and also the final event of the year.

It is revered by all who have played in it, and each year brings a new story line, greater intrigued and fantastic competition and camaraderie.

The 2024 edition is no different, yet in many ways it is, it is the 10th match played and with that comes a level of expectation never really felt before. The Tour have also marked this occasion by diverging from the traditional selection method and have created a team of Founding players to face off against a team of newcomers and have put two players that epitomize the Tour entirely, Andy Love and Paul Gowens, in charge of them.

We’ve heard the team announcement, we’ve witnessed the verbal sparring of the Captains, now we’ve unleashed EuroDov Reporter on 9 years’ worth of RyDov Cup records and thousands of sheets of data from Tour events to give us a blow by blow prediction from each match so sit back, enjoy and get ready to argue your case against EuroDov Reporter.

Match 10 in the morning singles features Stephen Hedges v Ally Greenshields.

Cometh the hour, cometh the man…who can forget Stephen Hedges heroics over the last three holes of the 2023 RyDov Cup. If Andy Love was ever looking for a talisman at the bottom of the order here he is.

This is such a contrasting match up. The bombastic Ally Greenshields, who possesses the ability to play some dazzling golf, with his carefree and easy going attitude, but equally feels just millimetres from disaster against the methodical and centred Stephen Hedges, who favours middle of the fairway tee shots, and punch and runs on to the green.

Hedges makes his 9th appearance in 2024, after making his debut in the second ever RyDov Cup. Greenshields on the other hand is making his second only appearance.

In 2023 Greenshields dispatched David McColgan on the way to winning on his debut but Hedges Snr. as seen off the likes of Kevin Brannan (16), Stuart Allan (17), Stuart Allan (19), and McColgan (21) over the years with his biggest stumbling block being Hedges Jnr. who has bettered him twice.

Hedges Snr. is rarely overpowered in his matches and as such this game will likely go the distance and if it gets into the last 3 holes, he’ll surely carry the spirit of 2024 with him. However, this is a game of mixed styles and mixed approaches and could result in not many halved holes out there, but when it comes down to it at the end of the match, I think this one is squared.

Team Love 6 – 4 Team Gowens