Golf: Campbell cruises into next round

SYDNEY - Michael Campbell showed no sign of a holiday hangover as he hammered Swede Mathias Gronberg 4 and 3 in the first round of the world matchplay golf championship in Melbourne yesterday.

On a day of upsets, the fifth-seeded New Zealander needed just 15 holes to advance into the top 32 of the $A9 million ($11.44 million) tournament.

He was never in trouble, going a hole up on the fourth and steadily extending his lead in warm conditions on The Metropolitan course with precise approach play.

Campbell has not played for nearly a month, choosing to spend most of December with his family after a hectic year that saw his world ranking rise to 14th.

He will face Japan's Toshi Izawa today after the 28th seed beat American Steve Pate on the 19th hole.

The result is already an improvement on last year's tournament for Campbell, who was eliminated 5 and 4 at La Costa, California, by top seed Tiger Woods in the opening round.

This tournament is missing Woods and a number of other stars from the United States and Europe who are unavailable, leaving Campbell with a fine chance to go a long way in the lucrative tournament.

Those chances improved when several top names were eliminated yesterday.

The biggest upset saw American second seed Hal Sutton go down to consistent Australian Nick O'Hern.

Sutton, who struggled all day with a back injury, was four holes down with six to play but took the match to the 21st hole before going down.

Other Americans eliminated were sixth seed Stewart Cink, eighth seed John Huston and 12th seed Kirk Triplett, while 10th-seeded Irishman Padraig Harrington can pack his bags.

Top seed Ernie Els, of South Africa, did enough to beat 64th-seeded Greg Kraft 3 and 2, while third seed Vijay Singh, of Fiji, was equally impressive in beating American Kevin Sutherland, 4 and 2.

Fourth seed American Tom Lehman beat Greg Chalmers 2-1, the only losing result for Australia.

Of the other home country golfers, Robert Allenby, Craig Parry and Stuart Appleby beat Japan's Nobuhito Sato and Americans Dennis Paulson and Kenny Perry, respectively.

- NZPA