The World Cup of Golf can't catch a break.
The tournament at Mission Hills in China served up an extraordinary finish Sunday, with Edoardo Molinari and Francesco Molinari of Italy overtaking the 54-hole leaders, Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell of Northern Ireland, and the defending champions, Henrik Stenson and Robert Karlsson of Sweden, on the final nine. The Molinaris posted a closing 68 in the alternate shot format and finished 29-under-par for the event, one shot better than the Irishmen and the Swedes.
Unfortunately for the brothers from Turin, who gave Italy its first victory in the 55-year history of the World Cup, everyone who follows golf was instead focused on the front gates of Isleworth, the exclusive golf community where Tiger Woods and his wife Elin hunkered down after Tiger’s now-infamous encounter with a fire hydrant.
Too bad. The Molinaris are players to watch (as I noted from last year’s World Cup). Francesco won the 2006 Italian Open and finished 14th on the European Tour money list this year, thanks to seven top 10 finishes. He made the cut in the three majors he played in 2009 (U.S. Open, British Open, PGA Championship); his only visit to the Masters was in 2006, when he caddied for Edoardo, who was competing as an amateur. Francesco is a terrific ball striker although his putting has been suspect at times.
Edoardo in 2005 became the first Italian to win the U.S. Amateur, notching that victory at Merion Golf Club in Philadelphia, which will host the 2013 U.S. Open. He’s a precision player – not surprising since he held off turning pro until he had earned his engineering degree from the University of Turin.
Edoardo secured a European Tour card via a top-25 finish on the European Challenge Tour in 2007, but he finished 147th on the big circuit’s money list the following year and failed to keep his status. Since then he’s blossomed on the Challenge Tour, where he won twice this year and topped the season money list, earning a return trip to the European Tour. A week before the World Cup, Edoardo won the Dunlop Phoenix event on the Japan Tour, which vaulted him to 87th on the Official World Golf Ranking. (Francesco is 37th.)
At 28 and 27 respectively, Edoardo and Francesco figure to do some damage on the European circuit in 2010 and beyond.
Meanwhile, the Woods episode ensured that the World Cup remains, at least for now, little more than a distant a blip on the American golfing public’s radar screen. The tournament is light on star power; only six of the top 25 in the Official World Golf Ranking made the trip to Mission Hills (Stenson, Sergio Garcia of Spain, Martin Kaymer of Germany, the English team of Ian Poulter and Ross Fisher, and McIlroy).
The highest ranked player from America in the OWGR is exempt into the World Cup, and he gets to pick his partner. The U.S. was represented this year by Nick Watney and John Merrick, who ended up in a five-way tie for seventh place at 20-under 268. At 31st on the OWGR, Watney was No. 12 on the U.S. eligibility list for the World Cup. (Merrick’s OWGR ranking is 139.)
Americans in particular are disinclined to leave home during Thanksgiving week.
“We travel enough as it is,” Brant Snedeker told me last year after tying for seventh with Ben Curtis at the World Cup, acknowledging that he might not be so adventurous when he’s older and has children. “We get precious little time with our families when we do have off time, so for guys like Ben who have kids, it’s kind of hard pull away for a week and go halfway around the world to play golf.”
Hence, there has been much speculation about the future of the World Cup. Yet despite the dearth of brand names, many believe the World Cup is the most undervalued property in the game. Its supporters hope the tournament will be the beneficiary of golf’s increased globalization on the heels of the sport’s acceptance into the Olympic Games. Moreover, it may gain more participation by European stars if the Race to Dubai turns out to be a one-shot wonder.
The World Cup stakeholders – Mission Hills Group, the title sponsor Omega watches, and the International Federation of PGA Tours – believe they have a brand with enough muscle to overcome the player inducement hurdle. (Mission Hills and Omega are contractually obligated to stage the World Cup through 2018.) Thanks to soccer, the term World Cup has huge cache around the globe. Before the Mission Hills deal was struck in 2006, the event truly was international, having been staged at various times in the United States, Italy, Greece, Malaysia, Spain, Argentina, Japan, South Africa, Australia, Indonesia, Colombia, Thailand, Venezuela, Singapore, France, Ireland, New Zealand and the Philippines.
The World Cup (originally the Canada Cup) has a rich history. Ben Hogan and Sam Snead won it in 1956. Snead was on back-to-back winners in 1960 and '61, teaming with Arnold Palmer and Jimmy Demaret. Palmer and Jack Nicklaus won it four times in the 60s, and Nicklaus teamed for victories with Lee Trevino in 1971 and Johnny Miller in '73.
Fred Couples and Davis Love III won the Cup four times in a row beginning in 1992. Woods has hoisted the trophy twice, with Mark O’Meara in 1999 and David Duval in 2000. Ernie Els is a two-time winner, in 1996 with Wayne Westner and in 2001 with Retief Goosen.
Woods hasn’t played in a World Cup since the U.S. won in 2000, and the event languished under the International Federation umbrella for the next six years. It gained new life in 2007 after a deal was hammered out among IMG, London-based Parallel Media Group (who as rival event organizers are strange bedfellows), Omega, the International Federation of PGA Tours and Mission Hills to bring the event to China through 2018.
The addition of Swiss luxury watchmaker Omega as title sponsor was problematic for the PGA Tour, which counts Omega’s rival Rolex among its most influential sponsors. But tournament organizers didn’t hesitate, since the presence of an enthusiastic and deep-pocketed sponsor like Omega, which was heavily involved in the presentation of the Beijing Olympics, is an increasing rarity in this economic climate.
“Last year we made a 12-year commitment to the Omega Mission Hills World Cup,” Omega CEO Stephen Urquhart said during the event’s opening ceremony in 2008. “We believe that the value of the World Cup is unique, and we intend to really elevate this to the status where it deserves to be.”
Several years ago, PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem promised Dr. David Chu, the Hong Kong real estate visionary who built the vast Mission Hills complex, that he would bring a World Golf Championships tournament to Mission Hills. What Chu got was the World Cup, but stripped of WGC status .
Meanwhile, the 5-year-old HSBC Champions in Shanghai has steadily gained traction and became a WGC event this year (with an asterisk, as the purse didn’t count for official money on the PGA Tour). Phil Mickelson’s head-to-head victory over Woods further burnished the HSBC Champions.
There’s speculation, however, that the HSBC Champions might move to the new golf complex being built by the Mission Hills Group on tropical Hainan Island, southwest of Hong Kong (about an hour by air).
In any case, you can be sure the HSBC Champions and Omega World Cup were topics of conversation when PGA Finchem made his fact-finding tour of Asia earlier this month.
WEIGH IN ON TIGER: Does he owe the public an explanation of his run-in with a fire hydrant? Cast your vote.
Comments