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Dunhill done Sponsors call end to Dunhill Cup, announce replacement
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland (AP) -- Sponsors of the Alfred Dunhill Cup team golf championship on Saturday called an end to the 16-year tournament at the home of golf and announced a new event along the lines of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am in the United States. The $1.5 million Dunhill Cup, first played in 1985 and once a magnet for the world's top-ranked players, is to be replaced by the $5 million Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, a part pro-am, part team competition to start next year spread over three different courses. The inaugural championship, which will count towards PGA European Tour prize money and also Ryder Cup points, will be staged October 18-21 next year. It will be staged at St. Andrews, Carnoustie and Kingsbarns Golf Links, a short car ride from the Old Course, which will stage the final round. The 72-hole, stroke-play competition will have a pro individual championship as well as a team event comprising one pro and one amateur. "We felt it was time for a change and we want to continue celebrating links golf," said Johann Rupert, chief executive of Richemont, Dunhill's holding company. "We have been fortunate in getting the cooperation of the three courses which will be involved. It will be like the AT&T but not exactly the same." The sponsors decided to change direction after this year's Dunhill Cup was weakened by the absence of many of the top stars. Players such as Tiger Woods, David Duval and Phil Mickelson stayed in the U.S. with the Presidents Cup being staged in Virginia next week, while European stars such as Lee Westwood, Sergio Garcia, Darren Clarke ad Nick Faldo also steered clear of the Dunhill Cup. The American trio who did make it to St. Andrews, Tom Lehman, John Daly and Larry Mize, was eliminated in the first round of group matches, while England, with no Westwood or Faldo, lost 3-0 to Wales, 2-1 to Scotland and 3-0 to Germany for its worst-ever performance in the competition. By contrast, when the tournament began, it attracted the biggest names in the game and players such as Greg Norman, Faldo, Daly, Payne Stewart, Fred Couples, Colin Montgomerie, Mickelson, Mark O'Meara, Ernie Els, Jose Mara Olazabal and Sergio Garcia have had their hands on the trophy and collected winners checks of $150,000. Woods played once in 1997 but the United States team went out in the semifinal. Organizers, who already have to pay appearance fees for the Dunhill Cup, hope that the different format and bigger prize money might tempt the stars back next year. "The prize money for the new tournament will be five million dollars, but it will not exactly cost us much more than this time," Rupert said. "You will understand that there are appearance fees and I'm afraid that I have to mention this. As a traditionalist, I feel it is wrong that appearance fees are sometimes more than the prize money. It is supposed to be a competition. "If the top players don't want to come, then we are going to have fun anyway celebrating links golf."
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