Golf Results - 01 February 2013

Following a meeting in Abu Dhabi of the European Tour's 15-man tournament committee, Paul McGinley was chosen as the man who is going to replace José María Olazábal as the European captain for the 2014 Ryder Cup being held at Gleneagles. After having received the support of many of the European players, including the public support from Rory McIlroy, the world No1, Ian Poulter and Luke Donald, McGinley beat Colin Montgomery to claim the coveted position.

On Friday last week, both Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods failed to hit the mark and make it beyond 36 holes and as a result both missed the cut for the third round of the European Tour's Abu Dhabi Championship. On the day Rory McIlroy failed to hit the fairway, while Tiger Woods incurred a bizarre two-stroke penalty after he hit his ball into a desert bush at the fifth and erroneously took a free drop.

At the pinnacle of the HSBC Championship on Sunday there was loads of drama, which turned out to be a disappointing finish for the start of Justin Rose's season and a fantastic start on the other hand for Jamie Donaldson. Donaldson carded a remarkable score after he fired five birdies in a closing four-under-par 68 to finish 14-under on 274. This put him just one ahead of the overnight leader Justin Rose, who carded 71 and Thorbjorn Olesen who scored 69.

As a result, Jamie Donaldson will be boosted by at least 17 places from his current world ranking of 47th on the next published world rankings table. It seems that he is intent on building on last year's result in which he managed to finish inside the top 20 of the European Tour's money list, as well as winning the Irish Open. Donaldson leaves Abu Dhabi around £282,000 (€337,000) richer. This is what he said after winning the HSBC Championship on Sunday, "Most fields we play in, all the players are great, of a high standard. This week in particular, this field was exceptionally strong."

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