Harrington’s status seeds Ireland third in World Cup

THANKS to Pádraig Harrington’s status as the 9th ranked golfer in the world when the draw was made, Ireland have been seeded third in the World Cup of Golf to be played at Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, on December 10-15.

Had the organisers waited until after Harrington’s victory in the Dunhill Links Championship at the weekend, they would have been in second spot with the Dubliner having improved three places to sixth, and so ahead of Fiji’s Vijay Singh.

The $3.5m World Cup was won by Harrington and Paul McGinley at Kiawah Island in 1997 and this is the sixth successive time that they have formed the Irish partnership. Prior to this year, the best placed available player on the world rankings filled the number one spot and the second man was chosen from his own tour’s order of merit.

This year, however, both places are taken from the world rankings.

Darren Clarke (now a rapidly downward spiralling 22nd in the rankings) qualifies for Ireland on both counts but he is committed to a tournament in Asia on the same week. Had the old criteria applied, McGinley (now 74th in the world) would have given way to Graeme McDowell, who is better positioned on the European Tour money list.

The US are seeded number one and will be represented by Phil Mickelson and David Toms, both appearing in the tournament for the first time. Once Mickelson indicated an interest in playing in the World Cup, there was never any chance of Tiger Woods being his partner. It is widely believed that they are not exactly the very best of friends.

In truth, though, the seedings don’t seem to mean anything. They are based on the world ranking of just one of the two-man teams regardless of the status of the second player. For instance, Fiji was second because Vijay Singh was ranked eighth even though its second man, Dinesh Chand, is an virtually unknown.

Ernie Els and Retief Goosen captured the title for South Africa last year in a four nation play-off but neither is available to defend it on this occasion.

The teams (in order of seeding):

1st, USA, Phil Mickelson and David Toms. 2nd, Fiji, Vijay Singh and Dinesh Chand. 3rd, Ireland, Padraig Harrington and Paul McGinley. 4th, New Zealand, Michael Campbell and Craig Perks. 5th, Argentina, Angel Cabrera and Eduardo Romero. 6th, Japan, Shigeki Maruyama and Toshi Izawa. 7th, Canada, Mike Weir and Ian Leggatt. 8th, Sweden, Niclas Fasth and Carl Pettersson. 9th, England, Justin Rose and Nick Faldo. 10th, Australia, Adam Scott and Craig Parry. 11th, Scotland, Paul Lawrie and Andrew Oldcorn. 12th, Korea, KJ Choi and Hur Suk-Ho. 13th, Denmark, Anders Hansen and Soren Hansen. 14th, France, Thomas Levet and Raphael Jacquelin. 15th, South Africa, Tim Clark and Rory Sabbatini. 16th, Wales, Ian Woosnam and Bradley Dredge. 17th, Trinidad and Tobago, Stephen and Robert Ames. 18th, Germany, Alex Cejka and Sven Struver. Host nation, Mexico.

Five more countries will be included after forthcoming qualifying tournaments in Malaysia and Mexico.