The first tentative steps towards a genuine world golf tour have at last been taken. Three tournaments, worth, in total, a minimum of $12 million, are to be added to the schedules in 1999; two will be in US, the other at Valderrama, Spain. The commissioner of the US Tour, Tim Finchem, speaking in Houston, Texas, said yesterday that each of the tournaments would be worth "not less" than $4 million and each would have a different format and different qualifying conditions. He added that a fourth such tournament would be added to the schedules in 2000, but that "that would be the extent of it".

Tom Lehman, the former British Open champion, welcomed the advent of the tournaments, saying: "It is very important for the best players to go head-to-head against each other as often as possible. The money that has been announced is great, but the competition is the best thing."

The first of the three will be a matchplay event at La Costa, California, in February 1999. Finchem said: "The top 64 players off the official world rankings will qualify. They will play 18-hole matches, with the number one matched against number 64, and so on, until they reach a 36-hole final."

The second event will be called an Invitational and will feature a field of between 36 to 48 players, all of them current - or soon to be current - Ryder or President's Cup players. It will be a 72-hole, no-cut, strokeplay event, probably at the Firestone Country Club, in Akron, Ohio, in August.

The third, at Valderrama in November, will be another strokeplay tournament, with the top 50 from the world rankings, plus the top 30 from the US Tour not otherwise qualified and, similarly, the top 20 from Europe and the top three from the South African, Australasian and Japanese tours, all not otherwise qualified.