Mass snub for golf's World Cup

Nine of the world’s top 10 golfers and 18 of the leading 40 have now turned down the chance to win nearly £400,000 (€580,000) at the World Cup in Portugal on November 17-20.

Americans Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Chris DiMarco, Jim Furyk, Kenny Perry, David Toms, Davis Love and Fred Couples have all declined invitations.

The United States will be represented instead by Stewart Cink and Zach Johnson, while the decisions of Vijay Singh, Michael Campbell, David Smail, Mike Weir, Stephen Ames, Nick Price and Thongchai Jaidee not to play mean Fiji, New Zealand, Trinidad and Tobago, Zimbabwe and Thailand are no longer among the 19 exempt nations.

In all, 31 players qualified but rejected the event.

The others to refuse a place in the field are South Africans Ernie Els and Retief Goosen, Australians Adam Scott and Stuart Appleby, Dane Thomas Bjorn, Scot Colin Montgomerie, Germany’s Bernhard Langer, Koreans SK Ho and Yong-eun Yang and Japan’s Shigeki Maruyama, Shingo Katayama, Keiichiro Fukabori, Toru Taniguchi, Yoshi Izawa, Ryoken Kawagishi and Tadahiro Takayama.

Sergio Garcia is the only member of the world’s top 10 who will be present at Vilamoura. He and Miguel Angel Jimenez will be trying to go one better for Spain than last year when they finished second in Seville to England’s Luke Donald and Paul Casey.

Donald has David Howell as his partner for the defence of the trophy, while Ireland again have Padraig Harrington and Paul McGinley, Scotland Stephen Gallacher and Scott Drummond and Wales Stephen Dodd and Bradley Dredge.

Cink and Johnson are, on paper at least, an improvement on last year’s American line-up. Scott Verplank and Bob Tway finished only joint seventh.

Eighteen nations come off the world rankings, Portugal are exempt as hosts and five more come from two qualifying events.