Fortune seeker Des Smyth has put his bid for the Ryder Cup captaincy behind him – for now.

Smyth is saddened by the fact that Colin Montgomerie and Nick Faldo look set to fight among themselves about which of them will get the job at the K Club in 2006.

“They have it all sewn up, don’t they,” said Smyth this week. “It’s sad, isn’t it, but that’s politics for you.

“I’m not going to make a big deal out of it but it was always going to be very tough.

“It was always out of my hands. I think everybody, the Irish public wanted an Irish captain because we have never had one and that’s as far as it goes. There is a lot of politics over there but, hey, we are going to keep chipping away.”

Like Eamonn Darcy and Christy O’Connor Jnr, Smyth has thrown his weight behind the unofficial campaign to have an Irishman captain the European team.

But now Smyth is set to concentrate all his energies on making megabucks on the renamed US Champions Tour when he turns 50 in February.

Smyth earned his card in November by winning the qualifying tournament in Florida with an almost faultless performance.

Now he has to do the hard bit and go out and put money in the bank to make sure that he keeps it.

“Qualifying went far better than I had planned,” he confessed. “I’d been thinking about the US Seniors Tour for a number of years and always had my eye on getting ready for what I called ‘the card thing’ in America.

“The good thing was that I ran into a bit of luck and my game started to get good at the back end of the year.

“I was never that happy with game even when I was going great in the Open at Muirfield. Maybe it was just the fact that I finished 10th in Madrid the week before going to Florida for the qualifying and had so much confidence.

“It’s the old thing in golf – confidence. When you have it you think you’ll never lose it and when you haven’t you think you’ll never get it back.

“That’s the way golf is. I walked away from Madrid thinking. ‘I could have won this week.’ When you can honestly say that, you know you are playing well.”

As second alternate, old pal Eamonn Darcy also claimed a US Champions Tour card and will get into more than enough tournaments to have a chance of retaining it.

“If he can get an early win under his belt he will have finished all his problems and can relax a bit,” said Smyth.

“But it’s never that easy. I was out there and I was quite taken by the standard.

“Everyone said, you’ll be so much better, but even though I played fantastic and I went out and I won the qualifying, the guy that won the last card was only four shots behind me.

“It was very tight. You can get carried away with the baloney people will talk to you but I’m long enough on the road now not to let that bother me.

“I’ve got to go out and do it. Getting a card is very difficult and I saw some great players miss out and one or two that got it said that it was their fourth or fifth time - really strong players.”

Smyth turns 50 on February 14 and will go into action almost immediately in the $1,600,000 ACE Group Classic, at Twin Eagles golf club in Naples, Florida from February 14-16.

“I start the minute I turn 50. In fact, I turn 50 on a Wednesday and then I tee up on Friday so I’m not wasting any time,” he explained.

But he won’t be playing in the Nissan Irish Open at Portmarnock from July 24-27.

“No, I definitely won’t be there,” he said. “I’ll be playing the Senior British Open at Turnberry that week. It’s part of the official US Senior Tour now and counts for the order of merit.

“I have to concentrate on getting into the top 31 on the money list to make sure of keeping a full card for 2004 although 50th place gives you something.”

Last year Japan’s Isao Aoki finished in 31st place with earnings of $653,836 (us dollars) from 19 events.

If Smyth can win a tournament, 2003 could be the richest yet in a sparkling 30-year career.

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© Brian Keogh 2002

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