Woods’ great fall gathers pace

ONCE the slide begins, it is incredible how quickly even the greatest can fall from grace.

Tiger Woods, so long the market leader in golf, continues to tumble from his throne and was yesterday ranked 12th in the world.

The situation concerning our own Pádraig Harrington is even more concerning.

Yesterday’s bulletin revealed the Dubliner has dropped another five spots to 48th with the fear he will have dropped out of the top 50 before he can resume after a hamstring injury.

Should that happen, and he is unable to redress the slide once fit, he would be in danger of missing lucrative tournaments where world ranking and 2011 Ryder Cup points are at stake.

Those injury free focus this week on the €5.1 million BMW Championship at Wentworth.

Luke Donald returned home yesterday €420,000 richer after finishing runner-up to fellow Englishman Ian Poulter in Sunday’s Volvo World Match Play Championship final in Spain.

But he remains number two in the world rankings behind Lee Westwood and faces a difficult task to claim the top spot, with Westwood and Martin Kaymer (ranked third) also in the field.

Ireland’s big two, Graeme McDowell and Rory McIlroy, remain fifth and sixth in the rankings as they bid for victory in the European Tour’s flagship event.

There is the usual strong contingent of Irishmen at Wentworth, including Darren Clarke and Michael Hoey, both winners on the European Tour in the past fortnight. Clarke’s success in Majorca was followed in Madeira on Sunday by Hoey.

Peter Lawrie, Gareth Maybin, Damien McGrane and Paul McGinley will also feature along with David Higgins and David Mortimer, who finished first and second in the 2010 Irish Region Race to Mount Juliet order of merit.

European Tour chief George O’Grady gives his annual mid-season appraisal of how things are going on the final day of the PGA, with an update on the status of the Irish Open expected.

Still without a title sponsor, there is no clarification about the prize fund, which is certain to be short of last year’s €3m. Until that figure is clearer, the quality of the field remains in doubt.

The good news, though, is that McDowell and McIlroy are set to feature.

It may seem strange to many that the top two places in the world rankings are held by players yet to win a major — Westwood has come close several times and Donald has been racking up the wins and high finishes — but it’s a far cry from the days when the rankings were dominated by Woods.

Today Woods is a spent force and Phil Mickelson isn’t making much of an impression in the race to fill the void.

With 44 year-old David Toms picking up the Crowne Plaza Colonial on Sunday, there is no sign of any other Americans launching a challenge to the Westwood-Donald-Kaymer axis.

Given the undoubted success of the Volvo Match Play event in Spain, it was ironic that the Irish Close Championship was decided over 72 holes of strokeplay at Shannon.

Matchplay has long been the essence of the amateur game and while the Close ran smoothly and the airport golf course came through with flying colours, many regretted the absence of the kind of excitement generated by the head to head battle.

THE Golfing Union of Ireland decision to switch from match to strokeplay for the first time was experimental and taken for very worthy reasons.

However, the Close is currently sandwiched between the Irish Amateur Open and East of Ireland championships, both also decided over 72 holes of strokeplay, and many will hope to see it quickly revert to matchplay.

This is not to detract from Paul Cutler’s victory. The young Portstewart golfer surely sealed his place in this year’s British & Irish Walker Cup team, after which he will turn professional.