Suddenly, the issue of drug-testing has more relevance than wondering who and how many will fail such exams in the Olympics, as those who attended a European Tour players' meeting here the other night discovered.

For players with their heads buried in the sand and unaware that testing would be implemented this July, both on the US Tour and the European Tour, the extent of the list of banned substances came as something of a surprise.

And Paul Casey observed that the lists were different on each tour: he noticed that more drugs for erectile dysfunction featured on the European list than on the American.

"Not that I need them," added Casey, lest anyone wonder why he should even notice.

While the US Tour has stepped rather gently into the whole area of drug testing, the European Tour has adopted the World Anti-Doping list of banned substances, and advisors were on hand at the meeting to inform players of what they should be aware of when taking vitamins and other supplements.

Yet, it wasn't just the drugs issue that gave players food for thought.

Paul McGinley, for one, is inclined to believe that the new drug policy is not as important a concern to players as the threat posed to big tournaments such as the European Open, which has lost its sponsor, and the Deutsche Bank TPC of Europe, which has disappeared off the calendar completely.

He laid the blame for the demise of tournaments such as the TPC in Germany firmly at the feet of the tour's bigger names, many of whom have chased dollars rather than euro.

McGinley, who is a member of the tournament players' committee, remarked: "I've no issues with the drug policy. Bring it on, as far as I'm concerned. I'm 100 per cent behind it, and it will give us the chance to show ourselves we're a clean sport.

"Personally, I think the bigger issue we need to face is getting our big players to commit more to our mainstay tournaments, the bread and butter of the tour, which is European-based events."

As the Dubliner, who is making his first appearance of the year here, pointed out: "We've already lost the Deutsche Bank and the European Open to a large extent because we haven't been able to get strong fields, and there are a lot of rumblings going on about the French Open too. My worry is more concerned with players supporting our heart, our core business. And our core business has always been Europe.

"Over the years we have spread our wings to Asia, South America, South Africa, and that's all great and wonderful, but our core business is Europe. Our core business is the European Opens of this world, and we need to address the problem of not having strong fields in such big-profile events with large amounts of prizemoney. That's my big issue."

Next year, the face of the European Tour will change even more with the advent of the megabucks Race to Dubai. The Dubai World Championship will replace the Volvo Masters in 2009 as the finale to the European Tour, with the tournament offering $10 million in prizemoney and a further $10 million in a bonus pool.

The players who met here heard a number of proposals, some saying the status quo should remain - that players must compete in 11 tournaments to retain their European Tour membership - while others wanted to raise that minimum to 13.

No decision will be made until the end of the year, but McGinley has firm views.

"The people rewarded for going to Dubai should be people who reward the tour during the year, and that's not the people who play seven world events, including the majors, and then just play a few appearances in Europe or in Asia where they get paid huge appearance money and get to 11."