NEWS

Notebook: Inaugural Thailand Golf Championship attracting big names

By PA Sport
Published on
Notebook: Inaugural Thailand Golf Championship attracting big names

Charl Schwartzel and Sergio Garcia have added further star power to the Asian Tour’s inaugural Thailand Golf Championship next month.

Masters champion Schwartzel and Spanish star Garcia, who scored back-to-back European Tour wins in October, will join a world-class field that already includes 2011 major winners Rory McIlroy and Darren Clarke along with world No. 3 Lee Westwood.

England's Simon Dyson, Japan's Presidents Cup star Ryo Ishikawa and two-time major winner John Daly will also compete in Asia's newest championship.

The organizing committee also confirmed that, due to the easing of the flood situation in Thailand, the $1 million event will be held as scheduled at Amata Spring Country Club from Dec. 15-18.

The tournament is the Asian Tour's season finale and the winner will receive a spot in the 2012 WGC-Bridgestone Invitational. It takes place one week after the 2011 European Tour season reaches its climax with the season-ending Dubai World Championship at the Jumeirah Golf Estates.

Amata Spring Country Club, rated as one of the finest in Asia, was unaffected by the recent floods.

WESTWOOD REJOINS PGA TOUR: Lee Westwood has decided to join the PGA Tour again. It will be the first time the English star has taken up PGA Tour membership since the 2008 season. The move requires Westwood to compete in 15 tournaments, which includes the four majors and World Golf Championships.

Westwood says he will return to The Players Championship, which he skipped this year because his schedule already was full. He also said he was intrigued watching the FedExCup playoffs on television and would like to take part in them.

Westwood started the year at No. 1 in the world and has since slipped to No. 3. He plans to start his American schedule next year at the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship in Arizona, which counts toward both the PGA Tour and European Tour.

SCHEDULING SITUATION: Rory McIlroy has a dilemma to overcome after the Irish Open was moved to the same week as the AT&T Championship on the PGA Tour.

McIlroy is torn after the European Tour switched Ireland's biggest golfing week from its traditional slot two weeks after the British Open to three weeks before the year's third major to avoid a clash with the 2012 London Olympics.

And that means the June 28-July 1 tournament in Ireland is now on in the same week as the PGA Tour stop at Congressional, the venue where McIlroy came of age by destroying the field in last year's U.S. Open.

"I haven't made a decision yet as to where I am going to play that week," he said. "That stretch between the U.S. Open and the Open is the only stretch in the first part of next year I have not decided on.  It's a tough one and I know I need to decide what I am going to do because the people in Ireland want to see me play in the Irish Open and if I don't play I know there will be a lot of comment."

McIlroy will get his 2012 season underway by joining Tiger Woods and Jason Day at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship. His first tournament in the United States will be in the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship starting on Feb. 20. He also will play in next week's UBS Hong Kong, then the Dubai World Championship and then the Thailand Golf Championship, his final event of the year.