Stars unlikely to be lured back to Europe

THOSE of you watching the Spanish Open on Sky Sports on Sunday afternoon and the Shell Houston Open that evening would have got a good idea why more and more players are deserting the European Tour for the American circuit.

On the one hand, we had a course on the island of Tenerife that looked quite suitable for a game on a fun sun holiday but which looked miles short of the kind of lay-out required for an event offering more than stg£200,000 to the winner. Heavens above, the only rough was the lava dust lining each fairway; not alone was it not very easy on the eye but in fact offered perfect lies for those straying from the straight and narrow.

Fast forward, then, to the Redstone Golf Club at Humble, near Houston, where you feasted your eyes on the most beautifully manicured course possible, complete with lakes, ponds, streams, expertly shaped fairways, graded rough, colourful foliage and beautifully contoured greens. You name it, Redstone had it and remember, this was the first time it had ever hosted a US Tour event.

Back again to Tenerife and a leaderboard dominated by a trio of players almost totally unknown to the general golfing public. Full marks to the winner Kenneth Ferrie and the two men he defeated in the play-off, the Swede Peter Hedblom and our own Peter Lawrie. They played superbly as their 72-hole, 22 under par totals amply demonstrate. Frankly, however, they are not names to set the pulses racing and I say this without any disrespect whatsoever to the new Spanish champion or to Lawrie, an absolute gentleman and quite obviously a fine golfer as well.

No, my difficulty with the Spanish Open was the absence of so many of Europe's top players. Sergio Garcia came home to support his home championship as did Jose-Maria Olazabal and the other top Spaniards.

Where, though, was Europe's top world-ranked player Padraig Harrington? Or other big names like Darren Clarke, Colin Montgomerie, Retief Goosen, Justin Rose, Nick Faldo, Angel Cabrera and Thomas Bjorn, not to mention the current top three in the money list, Ernie Els, Peter Lonard and Adam Scott? It's an easy question to answer, really.

These people can afford to cherry pick the events in which they compete and the weeks on which they take a rest. You won't see too many of them at the Madeira Island Open, the Algarve Portuguese Open, the Telecom Italian Open, the St Omer Open, the Turespana Mallorca Classic and such events.

The top players will readily admit these tournaments no longer hold any attraction for them. Those are the weeks they will try to plunder the American circuit or else stay at home, recharging the batteries and working on their golf game in preparation for the next lucrative week.

They won't be in Italy this week and the next time they are seen on this side of the Atlantic will be at the last ever Benson & Hedges International at The Belfry on May 8-11.

And speaking of ailing tournaments, there's another problem for the European Tour. B&H had no option but to depart because of the ban in Britain on tobacco advertising but the plug is being pulled after this year on the long-established Lancome Trophy.

The Irish Open was rescued at the very last minute by Nissan and will remain on the schedule for the next couple of years. Not so the English Open which has lost its sponsor, a serious psychological blow for an association with its headquarters in England.

It's not that the European Tour doesn't work extremely hard to ensure the viability of their product. I know each and every one of their officials to be diligent, sincere and hardworking on behalf of the Tour and its members. But past events and current trends don't help.

For instance, the difficulty in finding sponsors can be explained to some degree by the disappearance from the scene of the really charismatic players of the 80s and 90s like Ballesteros, Langer, Woosnam, Faldo, Olazabal, Lyle, maybe even Montgomerie and quite a few others.

It was always going to be difficult to replace such stars but in truth it has proved a whole lot tougher than most could have imagined. The best way would be to produce major winners but the last of those was Olazabal at Augusta in 1999 and since then few Europeans have gone even close.

Garcia plays most of his golf in the States, Clarke and Harrington will go there more and more as will several members of the bright, young brigade. Englishman Luke Donald is already doing so full-time. With appearance money almost a thing of the past (the exceptions are events like Dubai and the Deutsche Bank who are prepared to fork out $2 million each to have Tiger Woods in their field), putting together eye-catching fields is a bigger task than ever for Tour chief Ken Schofield and his team.