The 18 seeded nations that have earned the opportunity to compete in the World Golf Championships-EMC World Cup have been announced.
The event, which is sponsored by EMC Corp., the world leader in information storage, will be held November 13-18, 2001 at The Taiheiyo Club's Gotemba Course in Gotemba City, Japan.
Players qualify for this year's EMC World Cup by virtue of their standings in the Official World Golf Ranking. The highest ranked players representing 18 different countries will automatically qualify for the event. In addition, six teams will become eligible through the Davidoff Nations Cup, September 27-30 at Royal Selangor Golf Club in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
These nations have until September 19 to officially commit to the EMC World Cup. The seedings can change if the highest ranked player from each country does not commit to the tournament. In that case, the next highest ranked player from the country will have the opportunity to commit. If the next highest ranked player does not fall among the top-18 highest ranked, the country with the next highest ranked player will become eligible. Following the commitment deadline, the top-18 committed countries will be announced.
The following is the list of the top-18 countries:
Country Current Leading Player
. (Official World Golf Ranking)
.
1 - United States Tiger Woods (1)
2 - South Africa Ernie Els (4)
3 - Fiji Vijay Singh (5)
4 - Spain Sergio Garcia (7)
5 - Ireland Darren Clarke (8)
6 - Scotland Colin Montgomerie (10)
7 - England Lee Westwood (16)
8 - Canada Mike Weir (17)
9 - Denmark Thomas Bjorn (20)
10 - Germany Bernhard Langer (21)
11 - Sweden Jesper Parnevik (22)
12 - New Zealand Michael Campbell (25)
13 - Argentina Angel Cabrera (27)
14 - Australia Robert Allenby (34)
15 - Japan Toshi Izawa (36)
16 - Wales Phillip Price (56)
17 - Zimbabwe Mark McNulty (83)
18 - Paraguay Carlos Franco (95)
Alternates
19 - France Thomas Levet (102)
20 - Taiwan Keng-Chi Lin (130)
21 - Trinidad & Tobago Stephen Ames (131)
ABOUT THE EMC WORLD CUP
The EMC World Cup is one of four tournaments worldwide that make up the World Golf Championships. The 2001 EMC World Cup will be played the week of November 13-18 at The Taiheiyo Club's Gotemba Course in Gotemba City, Japan. This will be the second time that the will be contested as a World Golf Championships event. In 2000, Tiger Woods and David Duval, representing the United States, won at Buenos Aires Golf Club in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Players will qualify for this year's EMC World Cup by virtue of their standings in the Official World Golf Ranking. The highest ranked available players representing 18 countries will automatically qualify for the event. In addition, six teams will become eligible via the Davidoff Nations Cup. Each Federation member will determine its own criteria for the selection of the highest ranked player's partner.
This year's EMC World Cup will be the final of four World Golf Championships events to be contested in 2001. The Accenture Match Play Championship, held in January at The Metropolitan Club in Melbourne Australia, finished with Steve Stricker of the United States earning the title, defeating Sweden's Pierre Fulke in the Championship Match. Tiger Woods won his third consecutive NEC Invitational in August at Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, USA, while the American Express Championship will be held this week at Bellerive Country Club in St. Louis, Missouri, USA.
ABOUT EMC
EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) is the world leader in information storage systems, software, networks and services, providing the information infrastructure for a connected world. Information about EMC's products and services can be found at http://www.emc.com.
