Tuesday 21 April 2015 14:05, UK
Alexander Levy hopes to become the first player in Volvo China Open history to retain his title when he tees off in Shanghai on Thursday.
The Frenchman returns to the tournament where he secured his maiden European Tour title last April by beating Tommy Fleetwood by four strokes, the first of two victories last season.
While Levy admits to not yet hitting the heights of his last year's displays, missing the cut in three of his eight events this season, the world No 60 remains confident of a improvement performance this week.
“It’s nice to go back to a tournament as defending champion, especially when it’s your first title,” Levy said. “I just want to enjoy the week. I’m playing well and my game is in good shape, so hopefully it should be fun.
“I wasn’t playing very well at the start of the season, so I just decided to go back to what I was doing before – playing more aggressively, and not thinking about things too much. It seems to be working!
“I remember last year’s win very well, especially the last day, and of course the 62 on the second day. It’s mentally tough when you lead the tournament from the second round to the last hole, that’s the hardest way to win in my opinion.
“But it gave me a lot of confidence to win that way, because I knew then that my game was good enough and my mentality was strong enough to win big tournaments.”
New venue
The tournament has been switched to Tomson Shanghai Pudong GC this year, having been held at Genzon GC, venue of last week’s Shenzhen International, 12 months ago.
World No 55 Fleetwood is the highest ranked player in the field following a third place finish at last week’s event which secured him qualification to the WGC-Cadillac Match Play, while Volvo World Match Play Champion Mikko Ilonen heads to Shanghai looking to post a first top-20 finish of the season.
Former China Open winner Nicolas Colsearts will tee-off alongside Fleetwood this week, while recent European Tour winners Richie Ramsay, Andrew Dodt and Gary Stal all feature at the €3,000,000 event.
Home interest will be focused on teenager Li Hao-tong, who forced a play-off with Kiradech Aphibarnrat in Shenzhen on Sunday, with the former youngest player to make the cut at the Masters, Guan Tian-lang, also looking to become the first Chinese player to win a European Tour event on home soil.
Watch the Volvo China Open live from April 23-April 26 live on Sky Sports 4 – your home of golf.
