Will more Americans take up the membership of the European Tour?
The European Tour has announced that a new tournament, with name of Turkish Open, will take place from November, next year. The $ 7 million tournament will have a limited field of 78 players but this will surely attract players from America.
Many Americans do not play on the European Tour because firstly the European Tour is short and it is difficult to play a minimum of thirteen tournaments in a year while continuing to play at the PGA Tour.
However, that issue has also been resolved now, as the European Tour has announced that it will also count the appearances in the Ryder Cup and the Presidents Cup to make the players eligible for European Tour membership.
This will surely attract a number of top US golfers. Tiger Woods has already showed his intent of playing on the European Tour. Those who look to secure a big purse will also add Race to Dubai in their schedule.
Currently, the PGA Tour requires 15 appearances, whereas the European Tour requires 13. The fact is that many top players take part in the four majors and in the four WGC events.
This makes eight appearances for them on both the tours and if they include one international, then the tally would go to nine.
So practically, players would need to play just four tournaments on the European Tour and six tournaments on the PGA Tour for them to be eligible to play on both the tours.
This makes it very doable for the top golfers, to play on both the tours. Already many top Europeans are taking part on the PGA Tour as well.
The likes of Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Rory McIlroy and many other Europeans play their trade in America as well. The Belgian Nicolas Colsaerts is also vying for a PGA Tour card for the next season.
With so much travelling and so many golf tournaments being played around, it is very much possible that the likes of Webb Simpson, Bubba Watson, Dustin Johnson, and Keegan Bradley will soon be seen playing on the European Tour as well.
It is, in fact, better for the game of golf that these players should move around. It will not only attract more sponsors but it will also make the game more competitive.
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