Sport

Smyth joins Player's selection for seniors showdown

Des Smyth is in Kiawah Island this week as the only Irish golfer to represent a Rest of the World line-up

By DERMOT GILLEECE
Wed Nov 14 2001 - 00:00

Des Smyth is in Kiawah Island this week as the only Irish golfer to represent a Rest of the World line-up. The 48-year-old received a special invitation into a 12-man team, captained by Gary Player, which will face the US on Friday, Saturday and Sunday in the inaugural UBS Warburg Cup.

Intended essentially as a seniors event, the tournament is unique, however, for the fact each team includes six players aged between 40 and 49 years. This is the basis on which Smyth qualified, given the renewed prominence he achieved last March when capturing the Madeira Island Open to become the oldest winner in European Tour history.

"I can't believe I'm going to be competing with so many of the game's great players," said Smyth. "In fact I'll be renewing acquaintance with five members of the famous US Ryder Cup team I played against at Walton Heath in 1981."

They are: Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Raymond Floyd, Hale Irwin and Larry Nelson. The American line-up is completed by Scott Hoch, John Cook, Mark Calcavecchia, Loren Roberts, Curtis Strange, Mark O'Meara and playing-captain Arnold Palmer.

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The Rest of the World team with Player as playing-captain is: Des Smyth (Ireland), Bernhard Langer (Germany), Nick Faldo and Denis Durnian (England), Ian Woosnam (Wales), Jose-Maria Canizares (Spain), Sam Torrance (Scotland), Frank Nobilo (New Zealand), Isao Aoki (Japan), Ian Stanley and Stewart Ginn (both Australia).

An overall prize fund of $3 million means each member of the winning team will receive $150,000 while the runners-up get $100,000.

Kiawah Island has been kind to Irish competitors. David Feherty beat the late Payne Stewart by 2 and 1 in the Ryder Cup there in 1991 and six years later, it was the scene of a marvellous World Cup triumph by Padraig Harrington and Paul McGinley.

Meanwhile, McGinley will have just one day to recover from jet-lag before beginning the $3 million EMC World Cup in Japan. He was forced to change his travel plans after problems securing a visa in time for their flight on Monday. The delay meant instead of arriving in the early hours of Tuesday morning in Tokyo - along with England's Ian Poulter and Paul Casey, Scotland's Dean Robertson and Wales' Mark Mouland - they landed shortly before 4 p.m. on Tuesday afternoon.

Harrington and McGinley are one of the favourites to challenge defending champions Tiger Woods and David Duval.