adminSHANGHAI. — The absence of Tiger Woods will not go unnoticed at this week’s WGC-HSBC Champions golf tournament but the attendance of 40 of the world’s top 50 players suggests the tournament is living up to its billing as a World Golf Championships tournament.
The HSBC is the only WGC event played outside the United States but a US$8.5 million purse has still not been enough to lure world number one Woods to Sheshan International Golf Club.
With appearance money banned in official PGA Tour events, the 14-time major champion has snubbed the event since 2010.
This week, instead, he s participating in some lucrative corporate outings elsewhere in Asia following on from Monday’s exhibition match against Rory McIlroy on Hainan Island in South China.
World number two Adam Scott, who this year became the first Australian to win the Masters, is also missing as he prepares for a busy year-end schedule in his homeland, but the presence of British Open champion Phil Mickelson, US Open winner Justin Rose and two-time major champion McIlroy helps soften the blow.
Mickelson’s golf course design business is growing in China — he has a new course opening in Shanghai early next year — but his focus this week will be on clinching a Sheshan hat-trick, where he also won in 2007 and 2009. “I was not swinging well in Malaysia (but) the last two days my game started to come around,” Mickelson said. — Supertgolf.
Online Reporter