Ballesteros's award not for his golf

The order of Merit was presented to Severiano Ballesteros last night in Barcelona - but European number one Colin Montgomerie need not fear the loss of his sixth consecutive rankings success.

Ballesteros stepped up at the El Prat clubhouse last evening to receive the Olympic Order of Merit, a supreme award from the IOC and Juan Antonio Samaranch, who was there himself to hand it over.

If one wonders how Ballesteros could be receiving an award for a sport which is not an Olympic event, then his own words explained it: "I didn't expect a supreme honour like this.

But the main reason for getting it is through Mr Samaranch himself, I suspect, after my involvement helping to bring the Olympic Games to Barcelona in 1992.

"I was advertising Barcelona '92 for three years. But also, Mr Samaranch knows I am always fighting for the game of golf and that I want eventually to see it an Olympic sport if the authorities like the Royal and Ancient at St Andrews and the Professional Golfers' Associations can agree how it can be done."

Ballesteros normally wears his heart on his sleeve but his medallion was won for wearing Barcelona '92's advertisement on his hat in the years leading up to this city landing the Olympics.

At the venue where he won his first Spanish Open in 1981, Ballesteros conceded that he is not confident of lifting his fourth this week, and that even 18-year-old Spanish superstar-to-be Sergio Garcia has more chance this week of winning the £91,660 first prize.

Jose Maria Olazabal, who won the 1986 Sanyo Open here, deserves his `favourite' tag. Bernhard Langer and Ian Woosnam will also be among the most fancied contenders. Ireland's Padraig Harrington and Paul McGinley will be competing here for the first time, but will also have their admirers.

Harrington, of course, won this event two years ago in Madrid. Now that he has ended an admirable run, he feels he can concentrate his mind better on winning. He made 18 cuts in succession going back to last year. The run ended last week at the Cannes Open - and he was not displeased.

"Missing the cut was bound to happen to me some time and runs like that are made to be broken," he said.

"However, I have to say I'm quite happy this one is over because you can tend to be thinking more about making the cut than getting on with the real business of winning the tournament.

"Last week my whole game was stale, but I've done plenty of work in between - even working on my pivot to shorten my swing, although it wasn't the swing at fault on its own - and I like this course, so I can be optimistic. It's an old-style course in great shape and I'm looking forward to the tournament."

Harrington and McGinley head an Irish contingent which includes 1983 Spanish Open winner Eamonn Darcy, trying to find the form of last Saturday in Cannes which lifted him to second place after the third round, Philip Walton, Des Smyth and Raymond Burns.