Sami Välimäki

The 2020 Sir Henry Cotton Rookie-of-theYear hopes to continue his new love affair with desert golf to keep his name on captain Pádraig Harrington’s Ryder Cup radar

- KENT GRAY

SAMI VÄLIMÄKI’S STATUS as the mystery man of the European Tour is in serious danger.

We know, we know. How can you call the 2020 Sir Henry Cotton Rookie-of-theYear an enigma? Well, we get that the 22-year-old Fin won the Oman Open in just his sixth European Tour start and we thoroughly admired his flashy start cum fighting finish in the final round of the DP World Tour Championship in the company of eventual Race to Dubai champion Lee Westwood.

But beyond the nugget that he won at Al Mouj Golf just 18 months after completing compulsory military service with the Finnish Army, and that he reached as high as No.10 in the Amateur World Golf Ranking during a decorated junior career, relatively little of the Välimäki backstory has emerged.