Dave Tindall picks out his best final-round bets for the action at TPC Twin Cities.

As you do the Sunday food shop this morning, the likelihood is that you’ll overhear the pressing sporting matter of the day being discussed at various supermarket checkouts. Not who will win tonight’s Women’s Euro 2025 final between England and Spain but who will emerge victorious from a packed 54-hole leaderboard at the 3M Open.

Okay, I’m being daft but, blimey, this looks a tough one to solve. Nine players are separated by just two shots. The leaders at 18-under, Thorbjorn Olesen and Akshay Bhatia, got the tiniest bit of separation at the end of Saturday due to the Dane making a hole-in-one and the left-handed American chipping in twice.

Kurt Kitayama, Jake Knapp, Takumi Kanaya and Sam Stevens are a shot back while Alex Noren, Pierceson Coody and the massively in-form Chris Gotterup are just two of the pace.

And to be honest, how far back can we go before discounting anyone? Twice this week – Kitayama in round three and Adam Svensson on day one – we’ve seen players shoot 60. And it’s not as if either player telegraphed their stunning 11-under laps. Svensson was coming in off two missed cuts while Kitayama’s 60 followed a sluggish even-par 71 that had caused him to go to the range to try and work things out. Yep, this week has been a head scratcher.

Favourite worth taking on

Perhaps history can help. Okay, this is only the seventh edition of the event in Minnesota but all six previous winners – Matthew Wolff, Michael Thompson, Cameron Champ, Tony Finau, Lee Hodges and Jhonattan Vegas – were in the top four with 18 holes to play. Four of those were either leaders or co-leaders. Their third-round scores had ranged from 62 to 68 and all six had shot in the 60s each of their opening three laps.

I’ll say now, I’m a little suspicious of Bhatia. In his own words: “I chipped in twice, made a lot of putts. A lot of putts lipped in, which was really nice to see. I didn’t hit it particularly great off the tee. I definitely feel like it’s been a demoralising season for most of the year.” On the stats, he’s lost strokes Off The Tee for the last two rounds and that could catch up with him.

Bhatia looks a shaky 7/2 favourite to me. He heads the market ahead of 9/2 Olesen, 6/1 Knapp, 8/1 Kitayama, Stevens, 10/1 Gotterup, 12/1 Kitayama, 16/1 Coody and 18/1 Noren. If the trend about all past winners being in the top four after 54 holes plays out again, one of Bhatia, Olesen, Kitayama, Kanaya, Stevens and Knapp wins.

Which is handy as the one I trust most is JAKE KNAPP. The Californian, a winner in Mexico last year, was treading water for most of Saturday but then found a spark and birdied five of the final seven holes. There was one bogey in there too. His stats look more robust than those around him too. Knapp is 1st for SG: Off The Tee (historically important here) and 15th on Approach. His putting stats have improved by the day.

It may take a super-low one to get the job done and Knapp, of course, has that in him. We all remember his first-round 59 at PGA National in March but just three starts ago he was signing for a third-round 61 in the Rocket Classic. He was fourth there and has backed it up with a pair of top 25s in the John Deere and the Scottish Open. Many are on him pre-tournament but this is a good chance to grab extra profits or reap reward if you missed out. Back Knapp each-way at the general 6/1 (1/5 1,2,3).

Monster hitters have thrived at TPC Twin Cities in the past and it’s interesting to note that two of the top five in the current Driving Distance charts – Chris Gotterup and JESPER SVENSSON – are in contention here. Gotterup is tempting at 10/1 after his amazing fortnight in the UK resulted in a win in Scotland and third at Portrush and there’s a Ryder Cup spot to play for.

But I’m going to throw a dart at Svensson. The Swede had a run of poor Sundays earlier in the season but he seems to have worked it out. Svensson closed with a 65 to take 18th in June’s Canadian Open and, even more noteworthy, he posted 68-66 on the weekend at Royal Portrush to finish 16th in the Open Championship. He’s clearly carried that over to this week.

Svensson will start the final round in tied 10th place but just three shots off the lead. True, he has a lot of horses to gallop past but he rose 22 spots with a Saturday 63 and hopefully his current 111th in the FedEx Cup standings will act as an extra spur as he seeks to book a place in the top 70 who make the playoffs.

Speaking after that 63, he reflected: “Golf’s a funny game. It’s like been working on stuff for the whole season and I feel like something finally felt a little bit better at Portrush and sort of carried that same feeling going into this week.” The Rookie of the Year on the DP World Tour last season went to college (Campbell in North Carolina) in the States and his breakthrough victory came courtesy of a closing 63 in last year’s Porsche Singapore Classic.

It may take an even lower one to win this but there would be some nice symmetry if one Svensson (Adam) shot the lowest score (60) on day one and the other (Jesper) matched it in round four.

Posted at 0942 BST on 27/07/25

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