Could Young Guns be This Year's Masters Blasters?

Hideki Matsuyama is that man, and what a shot in the arm it would be for Asian and Japanese golf were he to be able to win the Masters; although it both broke Asia’s ‘Majors’ duck and signalled the presence of a vulnerability never before seen from Tiger Woods, YE Yang’s 2009 USAPGA Championship win has, to date felt like something of a false dawn.

25-year-old Matsuyama was all-but unstoppable at the start of the 2016 / 2017 PGA Tour season, second in the CIMB Classic in Kuala Lumpur in October, before becoming the first Asian player to win a WGC event, the HSBC Champions the following week.

Matsuyama finished the season by winning the Hero World Challenge came out of the traps at pace early in the current calendar year, finishing second behind Justin Thomas in the SBS Tournament of Champions in Hawaii, before winning the Phoenix Open, a fourth PGA Tour title.

The man from Japan has excellent credentials for Augusta, both the game and the temperament; witness how he shrugged-off a penalty stroke for slow play on debut in 2011, fifth in 2016 and tied for seventh last year, fully justifying his odds as third favourite behind Johnson and McIlroy.

Jason Day too has form at the Masters, three top-10 finishes in five outings at Augusta National, but he’s failed to sparkle so far this season, just one top-10 finish in five, and a single ‘Major’ title, the 2015 PGA Championship, but 12 top-10 finishes (including six in the top three) in 23 ‘Major’ starts could point to an inability to close the deal on the biggest of stages.