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 5 in the morning singles features Alan Duncan v Stevie Orr.

Let’s lay this out here straight away, this will be Orr’s first game back since the birth of his first child, will his game be close to that of the King’s Cup, where he tore the field up?

This should be a fairly entertaining match and it has many variations depending on what Alan Duncan and what Stevie Orr turns up.

Alan Duncan boasts a 50%-win rate in his RyDov Cup career and Orr is yet to get a win in the singles losing – as most rookies do – on his debut in 2022.

Duncan crashed out in round one of the Matchplay this year but Orr, ranked #15 made it all the way to the semi-finals before withdrawing after the birth of his son. There is no questioning Orr’s pedigree in the format.

Orr also carded a fantastic 5-under par 62 to lift the King’s Cup, making him one of only a handful of players to lift multiple Order of Merit events – he’s clearly no slouch on the course.

Alan Duncan is ferociously competitive, and he’ll go about his business with the plan of snagging the point, and despite the handicap differential in his favour, Team Gowens wins match 5.

Team Love 3 – 2 Team Gowens