Jason Day will try to carry the momentum of his brilliant finish at Kapalua to become the first Australian since Brett Ogle in 1994 to capture the Sony Open in Hawaii title when the tournament kicks off on Thursday.

Day, whose brilliant final round 62 came within a whisker ofbeing in a play-off for the title, is the form player among the nineAustralians who will tee up this week.

While the Queenslander has done little to impress in histhree previous appearances at the Waialae CC he is a vastly improved playersince last teeing up here in 2011 and will be among the favourites this week.

The Sony Open is the first tournament of the year for manyplayers and the five Australians who teed up at the winner’s only Kapaluatournament last week will be joined by anther four for the first full fieldevent of the year.

Robert Allenby, Stuart Appleby, Marc Leishman and CameronPercy join Day, Matt Jones, Steven Bowditch, John Senden and Geoff Ogilvy atWaialae.

The tournament hasn’t ben a happy hunting ground forAustralians in the past with Ogle’s 1994 victory and Bruce Crampton’s win in1969 the only two times Australians have hoisted the trophy.

Day aside there is little to suggest that is likely tochange this week. Both Allenby and Appleby have posted runner-up finishes here(Allenby 2010, Appleby 2000) but there are few top 10’s among the rest.

Geoff Ogilvy has teed up six times at the event for fourmissed cuts and a best finish of T8 while John Senden has never finished betterthan T20 in 11 attempts.

Marc Leishman might be the Australian to watch after a 5^thplace finish here last year and a T9 in 2013.

The Victorian is coming off a brilliant back half of 2014and while he did little of note during the Australian summer has improved hisresults in each of his five years on the PGA TOUR.

Of the rest Matt Jones played well at Kapalua last weekdespite a virus which saw him unable to eat for several days and Cameron Percyplays his sixth event of the season but first since November after earning hiscar via the Web.com Tour last year.