A charging Graeme McDowell had to settle for a share of fourth place at the European Players' Championship despite a second successive round of 65 that moved him to 20-under-par.

The Ulsterman was simply unable to make up the ground on Robert Karlsson who, apart from a double-bogey at the last, had played flawless golf since Thursday.

Karlsson moves into the automatic qualifying places for the Ryder Cup with his second European Tour title in two months having fired a closing 67 for a 25-under-par total of 263 to win by four shots.

Lee Westwood (69) birdied three of the last four holes to claim a share of second alongside 21-year-old South African Charl Schwartzel (67), one ahead of a four-strong group in fourth which included McDowell and world number five Retief Goosen.

Karlsson was controversially overlooked for a Ryder Cup wild card in 1999, but the 600,000 points on offer lifted the 36-year-old into seventh in the standings with just five weeks remaining before the team is finalised.

Leading by two shots overnight, Karlsson immediately saw that cut to one as Westwood birdied the first from 10ft. He went two clear again with a birdie on the par-five third and was crucially handed some breathing space when Westwood ran up a double bogey on the fourth after finding a water hazard with his approach and fluffing his pitch to the green.

A long birdie putt on the seventh briefly took Karlsson five clear of the chasing pack but Andres Romero then birdied four out of five holes from the ninth to get within two shots.

Karlsson responded superbly with an approach to two feet for birdie on the 11th and was again given a helping hand from his rivals when Romero ran up a double bogey five on the 14th.

That effectively sealed victory for Karlsson and he could even afford the luxury of losing a ball on the 18th to run up a double bogey six.