McIlroy’s march towards top of the world

NICE work, this professional golf!

Before arriving in Dubai last night for this week’s lucrative season-ending tournament in the United Arab Emirates, 20-year-old Irishman Rory McIlroy had already earned an amazing €2,538,449 this year.

Should he win the Dubai Championship on Sunday, he will pick up $1.25m (€835,000) and another $1.5m (€1m) for leading the Race to Dubai order of merit on the European Tour.

Only the top 15 in the standings qualify for the massive Dubai bonus money of $7.5m (€5m) and that leaves the other five Irishmen to concentrate solely on the same amount on offer in the tournament itself.

Pádraig Harrington is 18th in the money list with €1,119,349 and anxious to pick up his first win of 2009 and indeed his first since the US PGA Championship in August 2008. He remains sixth in the world rankings.

After Harrington in the European money list come Graeme McDowell, 32nd with €808,485; Peter Lawrie, 43rd, €854,685; Gareth Maybin, 56th on €578,527 and Damien McGrane, 58th on €546,182.

The hard luck Irish story concerns Darren Clarke who missed out on Dubai by one place. Clarke remains one of the most majestic ball strikers in the game. Unfortunately putting woes and a tendency to get down on himself when things are not going according to plan have proved costly.

However, there are consolations – like the €534,733 Clarke earned for finishing 61st on the money list. And even Kilkenny’s Gary Murphy, who has lost his Tour card for 2010, picked up €234,844 for his troubles.

So it’s not all doom and gloom for the likes of Clarke and Murphy in terms of their financial wellbeing.

For now, though, all eyes are on the remarkable McIlroy as he bids to become the second youngest winner of the European Tour order of merit after Seve Ballesteros.

His talent was clearly apparent from his earliest days but many others have looked the part at similar stages of their careers and yet failed to realise that potential. Rory, however, is the real deal and with more than 128,174 points to spare over closest rival, Lee Westwood, he’s odds-on with bookmakers to stay out in front on Sunday.

However as Westwood craftily pointed out, largely for McIlroy’s benefit: “If I win in Dubai, I win the title because the difference between 1st and 2nd is more than the amount between Rory and myself.”

Either way, the happenings in Dubai make for a fascinating scenario. And where McIlroy (now up to a career best 13th in the world) is concerned, this is only the beginning of an odyssey that will continue in January when he contests the Abu Dhabi Championship and two weeks later defends his Dubai Desert Classic crown.

And having taken the major step of joining the PGA US Tour, he plans to play eight events in succession across the Atlantic, beginning with the WGC-World Match Play Championship in Arizona in February.

His schedule will include three in a row in Europe, starting with the Barclays Scottish Open and including the British Open and the ‘3’ Irish Open at Killarney before another trip to the States for the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational and the US PGA.

As a result of losing his tour card, Murphy returns to the European Tour School over six rounds at the PGA Golf de Catalunya complex near Girona in Northern Spain (November 28-December 6).

While players of Murphy’s experience and achievement view such a prospect almost as a fate worse than death, 12 other Irishmen would be overjoyed at getting to Catalunya.

To do so, they must come through the 72-hole second qualifier starting today at four Spanish venues. This is regarded as a most trying test of a player’s nerve and commitment. Fail here and it’s all over for another year.

Five of the Irish involved over the next four days are former winners of the South of Ireland Championship: David Higgins (Waterville), 1994; Colm Moriarty (Athlone), 2002; Mervyn Owens (Mallow), 2003; Cian McNamara (Limerick), 2004, and Niall Kearney (Royal Dublin), 2007.

Higgins and Moriarty join Eddie Barr, Michael McGeady and Simon Thornton at Sherry Golf; McNamara goes into action at Arcos Gardens in Jerez along with Michael Collins and Gareth Shaw. Costa Ballena, also in Jerez, is the location for the challenge of this year’s Irish Walker Cup representative Niall Kearney and also Ulsterman Chris Devlin and Ashbourne professional John Kelly while Owens is the sole Irishman in the field at Hacienda del Alamo in Murcia.