With the WGC HSBC Champions event in China drawing the bulk of the PGA TOUR’s top tier overseas, the Sanderson Farms Championship in Mississippi represents a big opportunity for several Australians.

The weakened nature of the field sees Robert Allenby, Stuart Appleby, Mark Hensby and Steven Bowditch all earn starts despite all having limited status on the TOUR.

A total of eight Australians will tee up at the Country Club of Jackson, Cameron Percy making his first start of the new season while Web.com qualifier Matt Jones tees up for the second time as do Aaron Baddeley and Greg Chalmers.

Baddeley is the only one of the group with a top-10 finish since the tournament moved to this course in 2014 and will be keen to replicate that form this week after missing the cut at the season opener a fortnight ago.

Greg Chalmers suffered the same fate at the Safeway Open in California and an improvement on his T50 finish here last year would be a welcome way to hit back.

Matt Jones is the only Australian teeing up who played all four rounds at the season’s first event, an impressive performance given the hectic end to his season, and after a week’s rest should be in a good frame of mind heading to the first tee.

Earning back his PGA TOUR privileges at the last event of the Web.com Finals will have given the Sydneysider a boost in confidence and if he can parlay that into good early results will make his 2018 a less stressful affair than his past two seasons.

Percy will play 2018 in the same exemption category he had last year after finishing between 126 and 150 on the FedEx Cup and will likely earn starts at more than 20 events.

However, like Jones he will be looking for strong early performances to take the pressure off later in the season and with a best of T15 at this venue knows he can play well at the course.

For the remaining four the equation is simple: win or finish top-10 if they want to play again next week.

With almost no status on the Tour all four will be relying on sponsor invitations and Monday qualifying for the bulk of their appearances in 2018, a situation that can only be remedied by good play.