More Race to Dubai Fall Out

Peter Williams, in the New Zealand Herald, pens about the future of the New Zealand Open in light of the new European Tour schedule beginning in 2009. Much of it you have probably heard before, but Williams brings up this good point:

[I]t's not difficult to see that if the overflowing European schedule (55 events in 52 weeks) has to be condensed into 11 months culminating in Dubai, then the Tour will be tempted to drop the two events in Australia and New Zealand.

That's why Williams is eager for the OneAsia Tour in 2009 and for the Asian Tour to hop on board with it.

That's where the One Asia Tour could be a godsend. ... The ideal would be for the One Asia Tour to have weekly tournaments, starting in Australia and New Zealand in January, culminating with a Championship in Japan in mid-November. One Asia would be not far below the European and US Tours, offering at least US$1.5 million each a week.

The key will be a lucrative television deal, which is very possible as more than half the world's population will be in its catchment.

That next to last sentence is almost completely in accurate, but still, the rest of the concept sounds really great on paper.