United States Open champion Michael Campbell said on Wednesday he found it strange that so many top players had turned down the chance to win the largest first prize in golf at this week’s World Match Play Championship.
The 42nd annual edition of the autumn classic, offering a first prize of £1-million, begins on Thursday without several star players who had qualified.
Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh, Chris DiMarco, Sergio Garcia, Fred Couples and Davis Love III gave various reasons for staying away, including the fact that the Presidents Cup is being held next week.
”They are playing for a million-pound first prize and several players turned it down because it doesn’t fit into their schedule,” said Campbell. ”To me, I actually find that quite strange.
”It’s probably a slap in the face to the sponsors, and to the public eye, it doesn’t look good, I think.”
This will be the second time the tournament has had no Americans in the field, with the 2001 event being held just after the September 11 terror attacks.
Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Seve Ballesteros (five times) and Ernie Els (a record six times) have all won the event. Els is missing this time because of a knee injury.
”With the history and the past champions, it’s got to be right up there. I actually believe this is one of the fifth majors in the world,” said the fourth-seeded Campbell, who plays 13th-seeded Geoff Ogilvy in the first round of 36-hole matches.
Campbell and former champion Colin Montgomerie said they had not discussed the matter with the Americans, but thought maybe they felt they needed to rest or that England too far to come.
”I’m sure they still feel there is a safety issue here in Europe,” Montgomerie said.
”You put up last-place money of more than $100 000 and it still doesn’t seem to be enough to attract the top Americans,” the Scot added. ”I don’t know what else one has to do.”
Eighth-seeded Montgomerie plays ninth-seeded Mark Hensby on Thursday, and will meet the top-seeded Retief Goosen if the South African can beat European Open champion Kenneth Ferrie.
In the other first-round matches it is: Angel Cabrera (2) vs Trevor Immelman, Luke Donald (3) vs Bernhard Langer, Tim Clark (5) vs Steve Elkington, Thomas Bjorn (6) vs Paul McGinley and David Howell (7) vs Jose Marie Olazabal (10). — Sapa-AP