Golf: Card game keeps Lee from NZ Open

Danny Lee will miss the New Zealand Open. Photo / File

Through no fault of their own, New Zealand Open golf officials have missed their man. Danny Lee's determination to cling on to his European Tour card means he will be a notable absentee when the $500,000 championship starts at Clearwater Resort in Christchurch on December 1.

The 21-year-old will instead be strutting his stuff at the Hong Kong Open, which clashes directly with the New Zealand tournament.

Lee had fully intended to return to New Zealand for the championship but his precarious position on the European Tour order of merit means the latter must take priority. He enters the Singapore Open starting on Thursday 132nd on the moneylist with seasonal income of €186,308, a touch more than €49,000 outside the top 115 ranking he needs to clip his ticket for Europe in 2012.

Singapore marks the first of three late season Far East events Lee is to pitch his tent at, followed by the Iskander Johor Open in Malaysia starting on November 17.

Lee was a touch frustrated the scheduling bottleneck did not allow him to head home: "I really wanted to go back to New Zealand to play in the New Zealand Open but I want to keep my European card as well. I am really disappointed I can't get back," he said from his family home in Dallas, Texas.

Lee would have been a major drawcard for the New Zealand Open. At 182nd in the world, he is the sole Kiwi ranked inside the top 450, which says something of the struggles our leading professionals have had to hold their own on the various circuits around the globe.

As of next year, the 2008 US Amateur champion is set for a major promotion. He will become this country's only PGA Tour regular in the US in 2012 following a top season on the secondary Nationwide Tour.

Lee has come into his own this season, winning one Nationwide title, the WNB Classic, securing nine top 10 finishes, ending the season with the tour's best scoring average of 68.98, and earning US$326,100 to finish sixth on the moneylist, well inside the top 25 who gain automatic PGA Tour status next year.

"I am very happy with what I have done," he said. "At the start of the year I decided to play two tours which is obviously a hard thing to do. I still want to play two tours next year although my main priority will be the PGA Tour."

Lee, who left New Zealand in 2009 and has not played here in a professional capacity, vowed to get home for a future Open.

"Sometime in the future I will definitely get back to play the New Zealand Open. Hopefully that times comes really soon."

His last two appearances of note in New Zealand were at the 2009 Open and New Zealand PGA Championship, where he missed the cut and tied for seventh respectively.