Success on The European Tour’s Middle East swing looks set to have landed Jamie Donaldson, Stephen Gallacher and Chris Wood places in the WGC- Accenture Match Play Championship, with the trio all making significant strides on the Official World Golf Ranking.
The top 64 players on the Official World Golf Ranking on Monday February 11 will be guaranteed a place in Arizona for the season’s first World Golf Championships event.
Scotland’s Gallacher will be hoping he has done enough to seal a debut spot at Ritz Carlton Golf Club after winning the Omega Dubai Desert Classic at the weekend, a victory which moved him up 51 places on the OWGR from 111th to 60th position.
Similarly Englishman Wood, winner of the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters, will be looking closely at next Monday’s OWGR to see whether he has earned one of the coveted spots.
Wood is currently 61st on the OWGR and he will be hoping to return to Arizona after losing in the first round to Lee Westwood in his only appearance so far in 2010.
While Gallacher and Wood will join fellow European Tour Members, Germany’s Marcel Siem (62nd) and Ireland’s Shane Lowry (64th) in anxiously looking over their shoulders, Donaldson will have no such worries.
The Welshman is currently World Number 30 and has secured his debut appearance in WGC- Accenture Match Play Championship following his victory in the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship.
The next World Ranking milestones are Monday 25th February and Monday March 4, when those inside the top 50 will secure a place in the WGC Cadillac Championship.
After that, Monday April 1 will be the key OWGR for those players in the top 50 to secure an invitation to the Masters Tournament at Augusta National.
Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlroy continues to lead the OWGR, and is joined in the top five by fellow European Tour Members Luke Donald (third), Justin Rose (fourth) and Louis Oosthuizen (fifth).
Phil Mickelson returns to the top ten following his wire-to-wire victory in the Phoenix Open on the US PGA Tour.
