Harrington is highest ranked European

Golf's end-of-year world rankings provide festive cheer for some and gloomy reading for others.

Golf's end-of-year world rankings provide festive cheer for some and gloomy reading for others.

Ireland's Padraig Harrington has single-handedly since April kept Europe represented in the top 10. Having started the season at seventh the Dubliner ends it at eighth while Sergio Garcia has fallen from fourth to 36th and Colin Montgomerie from 10th to 41st.

Movers in 2003 include Tyrone's Darren Clarke (23rd to 11th), Fredrik Jacobson (83rd to 17th), Thomas Bjorn (35th to 19th), Paul Casey (104th to 23rd) and Open champion Ben Curtis. The American, 1,268th on January 1, now stands 34th.

Ryder Cup captain Bernhard Langer, meanwhile, has crashed from 16th to 89th and Jose Maria Olazabal from 38th to 93rd.

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The biggest slump of all, though, has come from David Duval. Tiger Woods' predecessor as world number one was third in the rankings at the end of 2001 and 15th this time last year, but currently stands 242nd.

Final world rankings for 2003 (end of 2002 in brackets):  1 (1) Tiger Woods 14.58pts, 2 (8) Vijay Singh 9.77, 3 (3) Ernie Els 8.41, 4 (9) Davis Love 7.53, 5 (11) Jim Furyk 6.81, 6 (46) Mike Weir 6.54, 7 (5) Retief Goosen 5.92, 8 (7) Padraig Harrington 5.28, 9 (6) David Toms 5.09, 10 (28) Kenny Perry 5.08  11 (23) Darren Clarke 4.26, 12 (13) Nick Price 4.06, 13 (165) Chad Campbell 3.84, 14 (32) Stuart Appleby 3.84, 15 (2) Phil Mickelson 3.83, 16 (25) Robert Allenby 3.67, 17 (83) Fredrik Jacobson 3.60, 18 (20) Charles Howell 3.39, 19 (35) Thomas Bjorn 3.31, 20 (17) Justin Leonard 3.28.