Darren Clarke launched another scathing attack on the organisers of this week's Cisco World Matchplay Championship today after the Ulsterman was snubbed from the 12-man field.
Clarke, ranked 22nd in the world, accused the organisers IMG (International Management Group) of compiling a lacklustre field and an entry list full of their own clients.
At first glance this could be construed as sour grapes from Clarke as he is represented by Chubby Chandler's IMS group (International Sports Management), who are rivals to IMG.
But his matchplay record stands up against the best in the world. In fact he did just that when he defeated Tiger Woods and David Duval en route to the World Matchplay title in California two years ago, while also playing an integral part of the last three Ryder European Ryder Cup teams.
Clarke criticised IMG's somewhat biased method of selecting the field: "It's not worthy of being called a world championship. It should be called the IMG invitational."
"It's something I'll be taking up with the tour. There should be a criteria for qualifying through the world rankings or various Orders of Merit," added Clarke who pointed out that all but three players (Ernie Els, Fred Funk and Michael Campbell) were from the IMG stable.
Clearly irate, Clarke pointed to the fact that IMG have also invited a series of lower-ranked players than him to compete. Those below him in the world standings are Funk (32nd in the world), Mike Weir (34th), Justin Rose (40th) and Nick Faldo (60th).
The tournament organiser and IMG member of staff, Peter German, strongly defended his and his employers position on the matter.
"We try to get a balanced field and that means different players every year. Darren played last year and has played in previous years but there is no guarantee that he can play every time," German told BBC Online.
German also defended the prestige of the event given Clarke's outbursts: "As to Darren's comments that this is not worthy of being a world championship, I'm sure he didn't feel that way when he was playing in it."
The 12-man knock-out event begins on Thursday at Wentworth in Surrey with the defending champion Ian Woosnam to play the winner of Faldo and Campbell's first round match.
Padraig Harrington is the only Irishman in the field and his first challenge will be from the Canadian left-hander Weir in the £1 million event.