Golf guru Butch Harmon has tipped Merseyside native Tommy Fleetwood to triumph in the 2025 Masters at Augusta, which tees of on Thursday, April 10.
Harmon, the former coach of Tiger Woods, believes the Olympic silver-medallist has adapted his game for the “easiest” major to win.
Defending champion Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy are the two hot favourites for the first major of the season, but the British number one has been tipped to win the Masters’ Green Jacket.
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However, Fleetwood has yet to win on the other side of the Atlantic, twice finishing runner-up in the 2018 US Open and the 2019 Open Championship. The Ryder Cup hero recorded his best Masters finish last year, tied third.
Coach Butch Harmon, speaking from his academy in Las Vegas, the American said: “I will go away from choosing the two obvious ones in Rory and Scottie Scheffler and pick Tommy as my winner this week.
“His game suits Augusta very well. He is a right to left player. I have done some work with him this year trying to hit the ball a little higher going into the greens because the greens get very firm and fast. I think Tommy’s game suits Augusta.”
Fleetwood, who recently received an honorary fellowship for his sporting achievements and work with Liverpool John Moore’s School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, hopes to find himself in contention for the Green Jacket.
Speaking to Mersey Sport Live, he said: “I’d love to get myself into contention, do the right things and see how I feel and how well I can play finding myself up there on the Saturday and Sunday and from there who knows.”
Everton fan Fleetwood, is the first player in PGA Tour history to earn over $25m (he has banked $26.8m in 150 events) without a win.
Harmon said: "He has never won on the PGA Tour but he has had a lot of seconds. He has had his chances - he puts himself in there. The key is, as long as you keep putting yourself in there, your time is going to come.
“It is just so hard to win these Majors. But having said that, the Masters is the easiest of all of them to win because there are only about 90 players in the field, a lot of those are former champions so they are not going to have a chance.
"A lot of them are first or second timers. Jack Nicklaus used to say that the field whittles down to only about 10 or 12 people who have a chance and I would definitely put Tommy Fleetwood in that category.”
