GOLF/European Tour: The fear was that the West Course, one as familiar to players as any on tour, had become a pussycat. It had lost its bite, so to speak. So, the brief given to Ernie Els - the three-time major champion tasked with tweaking it - was to give it back some teeth, which is precisely what he has done in time for the BMW Championship, the €4.25 million flagship tournament of the PGA European Tour, that starts at Wentworth today.

This has not been a case of Tiger-proofing, more a case of moving with the times.

In recent years, the reality was that the course had become too easy; or, certainly, that scoring was simply too good.

The world's best players, and some who weren't, destroyed the course, as reflected by Scott Drummond being 19-under-par when winning in 2004, a year after Igancio Garrdio won with an 18-under total and two years after Anders Hansen also won with 19-under.

What Els has done in a modernising programme that commenced last September is to lengthen the course by 310 yards, construct eight new teeing grounds and add 30 new bunkers. He has attempted to retain the characteristics of Harry Colt's original design.

"It was not our intention to change the character of the golf course, that would have been a crime," said Els, whose work - it must be said - has impressed his peers.

"They're good, you have to play better golf. It demands a higher level of accuracy now than before," said Jose Maria Olazabal, while Luke Donald reckoned that the changes make the course "definitely a couple of shots harder".

Padraig Harrington, who himself is considering a number of course design projects, has never been a great lover of the West Course's greens at this time of year.

However, the changes are to his liking, particularly the way that a driver has been put back into a player's hands with the extra length, subtle changing of tees and additional bunkering combining to allow for more generous fairways.

"Now, we're hitting driver into a wider area with a bit more punishment for missing that area," he observed.

In all, there have been changes of one sort or another to 17 holes, the exception being the uphill par three 14th.

Some alterations have been more dramatic than others, with the biggest changes coming to the fourth hole, which has been extended by 54 yards; the sixth, which is 67 yards longer and where the existing fairway bunkers have been brought back into play; and the 18th, where the tee has been moved back 17 yards to make it harder to cut the corner.

But the really big difference to the finishing hole is the addition of a further six greenside bunkers, making 12 in total on the hole.

Among them are cross bunkers in front of the green, in true Harry Colt style, which makes it impossible for players to run the ball onto the green.

"Hopefully Harry Colt is up there somewhere and looking down on us with a nod of approval," remarked Els.

While Harrington was generally enthusiastic of the changes he first encountered in practice on Tuesday and again during yesterday's pro-am, there was some surprise that an opportunity wasn't taken to reconstruct the greens.

"The greens are the first thing I'd have done," admitted the Dubliner.

"You buy a car, do you expect it to last 100 years? No, after 10 years it is considered old and you change it. It's the same with greens. You can't expect them to last forever."

These old greens have exasperated Harrington through the years, so much so that he even took the decision not to play in this championship for two years (missing out in 2003 and 2004). He was 11th last year, equalling his best-ever performance, but the mystery of the poa annua greens - ironically, similar to the ones he grew up playing on as youngster - continue to perturb him.

A case in point came in practice on Tuesday evening.

On the 16th green, he had a four-foot putt which he hit inside-left of the cup and rolled it in. Then, he hit a similar length putt from the opposite side of the hole.

"I hit one inside right from the other side of the hole, and it missed left. First one went straight, and the second one broke four inches left.

"What does that do to your head? I'll tell you what it does to your head. If you miss a few like that, it does your head in. But if you're holing in a few, you forget about it.

"So it is a question of going out there, holing a few putts, and believing it is your week. That's what happens with pao annua greens. A few people will putt very well and hole putts because, when you get your eye in on poa annua greens, the ball goes in."

In terms of improving his Ryder Cup position - he is still outside an automatic qualifying place - Harrington knows this is a big week.

"It's fine playing nice golf like I did last week (in the Irish Open) and finishing 11th but I've got to go out to win an event to make life easy for myself," he said.

"I'll struggle to make any Ryder Cup team if I am trying to make it with 40,000 point units like last week.

"I've got to get bigger cheques, like the 300,000 units Thomas got. He's gone from being well out of it to being right up there."

First, though, Harrington will have to hole a few putts to ease his mind and, perhaps, make a determined bid for contention having finished 11th-14th-11th in his last three tournaments.

"It's always nice to come back to a golf course where you're trying to battle yourself more so than the field," he added.

You feel, that's the way Harrington prefers it to be.