Managers retaining their faith in unlucky Hoey

MICHAEL HOEY has had a fairly miserable time of it in recent weeks, the Ballymoney native disqualified from the Irish Open for having too many clubs in his bag, then having to withdraw from the BMW PGA Championship because of illness, before missing the cut at last week’s European Open.

Things, surely, can only get better at this week’s Wales Open? Despite his woes, though, Hoey, two months in to the competition, is our most popular player, as he was at registration time, featuring in 1,562 teams. Just 38 managers have abandoned ship since we started out, the rest deciding that at €800,000 – Jonathan Caldwell is the only ‘cheaper’ Irish player – he’s still a more sensible Irish investment than, say Pádraig Harrington at €6.0m, or Rory McIlroy at €4.5m.

The biggest mover in our ‘most popular’ top 10 is Thomas Bjorn whose 2009 form, which has seen him win €173,000 to date, has attracted 287 new managers since you all had to pick your initial line-ups.

Tiger Woods, meanwhile, has lost the trust of 252 of the 789 managers who spent the bulk of their budget on him at registration time, though we suspect many will use their transfers to shift him in and out according to his playing schedule.

Most popular players

1 Michael Hoey 1,5621,600

2 Rory McIlroy 1,453 1,328

3 JJ Henry 1,042 1,086

4 Thomas Bjorn 1,004 717

5 Graeme McDowell 902 748

6 Oliver Fisher 781 850

7 Nick Watney 776 960

8 Chris DiMarco 674 715

9 Damien McGrane 673 683

10 Bo Van Pelt 648 668