Padraig Harrington fires OWGR warning

Three-time major winner Padraig Harrington warned young PGA Tour pros could be “squeezed out” of the game due to recent changes to golf’s world rankings.

Alterations to the OWGR system – specifically how the strength of fields are calculated – came into effect earlier this year.

Since then the rankings have been criticised with former world No.1 Jon Rahm branding them “laughable” and Tiger Woods describing the system as “flawed”.

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Now Harrington, who captained Europe at last year’s Ryder Cup, has claimed there is another potential downside to the new system.

The 51-year-old criticised the strokes-gained rankings, which are used to calculate the strength of field, for creating a “false narrative” which he says causes DP World Tour players to underperform in PGA Tour events.

“I constantly see good European players play one-off tournaments on the PGA Tour like they are playing a final of a tour school,” he wrote on Twitter.

“Out of their comfort zone they underperform on a new and unfamiliar course (remember they also get the worst draw possible), thus often a top-20 player in Europe fails to make a cut and is beaten by some of the lower-ranked players on the PGA Tour.

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“This now reflects terribly on all his fellow European members’ SG as he’s outscoring the European members consistently in his home environment.”

“I actually believe that the new system will force more international players earlier in their careers to the PGA Tour, squeezing out home-grown US players,” he added.

“If there’s ten more internationals that’s ten less US players leading to protectionist measures that many other sports leagues around the world have had to introduce when they become too dominant. Careers will become more transient and shorter.”