GOLF:Europe and the USA will go head-to-head at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, South Wales, in the week beginning September 27th - two years after Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky, hosts the event.
The organisers of the 2010 Ryder Cup confirmed preparations were under way for a successful tournament when the dates of the event were confirmed yesterday.
Tournament bosses were joined by the Welsh Assembly's First Minister, Rhodri Morgan, in Cardiff to announce the dates. They unveiled a placard with 184 weeks - the amount of time before competitors tee off - on the steps of the Assembly.
European Tour chief executive George O'Grady said: "We have had a meeting chaired by the First Minister today and the preparations are excellent.
"When the First Minister chairs these meetings it shows the commitment of Wales and his personal commitment. This means that the countdown has truly begun for when The Ryder Cup will be played in Wales for the first time."
Russell Phillips, Celtic Manor's facilities and construction chief said: "The course is complete, which is the first milestone, and we will play some golf on there in June this year. The clubhouse is due for an official opening in October this year."
Morgan added: "It's our Olympics - we can't host the Olympics because we are too small a country - but we can host the Ryder Cup.
"It's the largest tournament that we can host effectively and we are determined that it will be Wales's showcase to the world."
In the same week as the main match at Celtic Manor, the Junior Ryder Cup will be at Gleneagles in Scotland. Last year's match ended in a 6-6 tie.
Meanwhile, former Ryder Cup player Barry Lane goes down memory lane in Portugal this week - but it is not a nice memory. One of the European Tour's longest-serving members led the Portuguese Open at Oitavos by one shot with one hole to play two years ago - and then crashed to an horrendous quintuple-bogey nine.
Instead of celebrating just his sixth victory in over 500 Order of Merit events the title went to Paul Broadhurst and Lane was left to reflect on a five-minute nightmare.
Having just watched Paul Lawrie toss away the lead with a triple bogey on the 17th, Lane went into a bush with his closing drive, hacked across the fairway into more trouble and then with his third shot caught a tree root and saw the ball gently loop over the out of bounds fence a few yards away.
Even a bogey would have put him into a play-off, but there was no way back after that and after eventually slumping to fifth place he sighed: "One shot has cost me dearly - but that's golf."
Lane, now 46, has not won since, but it has not stopped him trying and he said today: "I'd love to have the same situation again."
Fourteen years on from his one Ryder Cup cap at The Belfry, the Englishman is now up to 577 appearances, seventh in the all-time list, and already this season has been to Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Malaysia, Singapore and China.
Not with much success, it has to be said. He did not make the halfway cut in the first seven and finished only 46th in the TCL Classic two weeks ago.
Now he is back at Oitavos, west of Lisbon, attempting to stop Broadhurst not only winning again on the course, but also making it three victories in a row in the event.
The 41-year-old retained the title at Penina last year and so has the chance to join just four players who have achieved hat-tricks on the circuit - Ian Woosnam (Monte Carlo 1990-92), Nick Faldo (Irish Open 1991-93), Colin Montgomerie (PGA Championship at Wentworth 1998-2000) and Tiger Woods, who did it at the NEC Invitational in Akron from 1999-2001 and then on Sunday achieved the feat again at the CA World Championship in Miami.
"To win it twice was brilliant and it would be fantastic to win for a third time and join that list of players," said Broadhurst, for whom the first win ended 10 barren years during which he twice had to return to the tour qualifying school.
Last week he was only 45th in Florida and a closing 77 did not send him back to Europe in the most optimistic of moods.
"I struggled big time," he commented. "I was losing everything left on the driving range and that's how I started the round.
"I was disappointed with the way I finished last season and have been trying to make some changes.
"I've not played that much, but if I can get into contention hopefully the experience of the last two years will pull me through.
"I didn't get the chance to defend at Oitavos last year, but it's good to be back there again - it's a tough golf course with a really tough finish." As Lane knows to his cost.
Setanta Sports complete deal on golf channel
Setanta Sports and UPC Ireland (the parent company of NTL and Chorus) announced yesterday that Setanta's new golf channel is now available for subscription to NTL and Chorus customers, writes Gavin Cummiskey.
Previously, it had only been available to Sky Digital subscribers. The golf channel will broadcast live coverage of the US PGA tour, Champions tour, the Nationwide tour and Asian tour.
The companies agreed to extend the distribution of the Setanta Ireland channel to over 595,000 customers across the NTL and Chorus cable operations.
This deal enables Chorus customers to receive the Setanta Ireland channel as part of their basic package. Also, from August all 79 Premiership soccer matches to be broadcast on Setanta channels will be available on NTL and Chorus networks.
Royal County Down voted best course
Royal County Down GC in Northern Ireland has been voted number one among the 100 best courses outside the USA by the prestigious Golf Digest magazine.
Golf Digest compiled its second biennial ranking of the 100 Best Courses Outside the US from a list of courses from 30 countries.
Royal County Down just edges out The Old Course at St Andrews which was number one in the inaugural ranking in 2005.
The remainder of the Top 10 are: 3 Royal Dornoch GC (Scotland), 4 Royal Portrush (Northern Ireland), 5 Muirfield (Scotland), 6 Royal Melbourne (Australia), 7 Ballybunion (Ireland), 8 Turnberry Hotel (Scotland), 9 Carnoustie (Scotland) and 10 Cape Kidnappers (New Zealand).
The full ranking a appears in the magazine's May issue and can be viewed online at www.golfdigest.com/100greatest
