Golf: Waite is miffed at being left out

A miffed Grant Waite is threatening to skip the New Zealand Open golf tournament in January after not being selected to play in the World Championship pairs in Argentina next week.

Waite was diplomatic when speaking from his home in Orlando, Florida, but he clearly saw it as a rebuff that he was not included in the New Zealand team.

"It's a question I've been trying to figure out," Waite said. "They're free to do whatever they want, but I'm not sure what criteria they used."

Instead, New Zealand are sending Greg Turner, who has played only spasmodically this year but has a higher world ranking than Waite's 131, and Frank Nobilo, who has struggled all year.

Waite and Michael Campbell are New Zealand's hottest golfing properties of the moment. Campbell had to withdraw from the trip to Buenos Aires because his wife is expecting a baby.

While Nobilo is 152nd on the United States PGA Tour money-list, Waite is 37th, and even fellow Manawatu professional Craig Perks is higher than Nobilo, at 136th.

The United States are sending their top players, Tiger Woods and David Duval, to Argentina.

Waite is now waiting to see which PGA Tour event clashes with the New Zealand Open in January, which offers relatively paltry prizemoney of $500,000.

"The only reason I've been coming to the Open is out of loyalty to New Zealand golf," he said.

"Now I'll have to weigh up whether to come down to play, or stay in the United States where I can turn out for a lot more money and have a lot less aggravation of not having to fly so far."

The executive director of the New Zealand PGA, Peter Wylie, said the anomaly came about because the team for Argentina had to be picked in August.

"The selections were made some time ago and Grant at that time was behind in the world rankings. Since then he has rapidly overtaken Frank. This is very unfortunate."

- NZPA