Stricker makes long journey to Qatar

Golf: The strength of the field at this week's Qatar Open has resulted in American Steve Stricker ending his 16-year European…

Golf:The strength of the field at this week's Qatar Open has resulted in American Steve Stricker ending his 16-year European Tour absence. The world number seven is a surprise entrant and joins a field boasting the world number one Lee Westwood and second-ranked Martin Kaymer along with five others inside the world's top-20.

"That's a big reason what lured me to come over here is the strength of the field," said Stricker in Doha today. "You have Westwood and Kaymer, and Paul Casey winning last week (in Bahrain), moving into sixth position on the rankings. So you've got a strong field here, along with other players, Robert Karlsson, past winner from last year."

Stricker was quizzed if he considered Europe a stronger tour than the PGA Tour with six of the world's top-10 being European.

"Right now, it's kind of going in cycles where you'll have a part of the world dominating the game for a while, like Tiger (Woods) and Phil (Mickelson) who were one and two for a period of time," said Stricker.

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"Now you've got Westwood and Kaymer who have been playing some great golf over the last year, so it kind of goes in cycles. But right now, obviously the top players are over here in Europe and that is part of the reason why I came here to try to play well in this event."

Stricker, who has made 11 appearances in the British Open, has played in just one regular European Tour event in his 20-year professional career when he finished 19th in the 1995 Scottish Open at Carnoustie.

The American showed his dedication to compete in the Middle East by travelling 20 hours to reach his Doha hotel last Friday and is still feeling the effects.

"I flew out of Wisconsin and went to Chicago, Chicago to Washington Dulles and then Dulles straight here to Doha, and we got here Friday evening," he said. "I'm still trying to get my feet on the ground a little bit from the jet-lag but it's been good and I'm glad I came.

"Qatar is an exciting place, and quite what I expected but then the buildings are a little bit different than what I expected, and there is a lot of building going on around here. "

The American has arrived in the Qatari capital in good form having secured two top-10 results in his first two events this year. He finished tied fourth in the PGA Tour season opening Tournament of Champions and shared ninth place a week later in the Sony Open.

"It's been a good start to my year," he said. "I played those two events in Hawaii and had a real good opportunity to win the first tournament of the year and didn't, and had another Top-10 at the next event and haven't played since."

Organisers have drawn Stricker to play alongside Westwood and 2009 champion Karlsson.

There are five Irish players in this week’s field; Damien McGrane. Peter Lawrie, Paul McGinley, Darren Clarke and Michael Hoey.