Golf: Lawrie hopes NZ Open will lift his ranking

MELBOURNE - Scottish golfer Paul Lawrie arrives in New Zealand today for the first time keen to end a winless streak approaching three years in duration.

Lawrie is the only player contesting the New Zealand Open, starting at Gulf Harbour Country Club near Auckland on Thursday, to have won a major.

He came through final qualifying to win the 1999 British Open in a playoff at Carnoustie. Lawrie came from 10 shots back at the start of the last day to force a playoff with Frenchman Jean Van de Velde and American Justin Leonard.

But his last taste of victory came in 2002 when he claimed his fifth European Tour win by capturing the Wales Open.

Lawrie, 36, has endured a lean spell since then, missing the halfway cut in 12 of 23 events in Europe in 2004 as he plummeted to to 140th on the moneylist.

He began 2005 at a lowly 320th in the world rankings, tied for 33rd in the Caltex Masters in Singapore last month and left Melbourne today after finishing in a tie for 45th on one-under-par 283 in the Heineken Classic yesterday.

"My world ranking is way down at the moment, so that it something I need to work on over these three first events," Lawrie said.

"... the goal in travelling to Singapore, Melbourne and Gulf Harbour is to try and compete in one of them.

"I played well in the Singapore Masters and it was good to start the year by playing all four rounds. I hadn't played a lot up in recent months up until Singapore so that a good positive start to the year."

There was plenty of positives in Lawrie's play in Melbourne as reflected by his posting an eagle and 14 birdies over the four rounds.

"My game can't be that far away because if you keep shooting three or four-under for about 12 holes but then it's just frustrating when you drop a few coming in," he said.

"There were times out there over the four days my golf was really good and I just need to rid my play of the one of two bad shots that are hurting me.

"There's no denying I have had a terrible run but when you consider I also made the cut in my last two events of last year, that's now four in a row.

"My results have all been around 30th and 50th so we are getting there.

"They may be small steps but at least they are steps in the right direction."

- NZPA