"The financial crisis gave the European Tour a perfect chance to get together with other tours around the world"

John Huggan explains why Rory McIlroy's pending decision to play four more times on the PGA Tour could prove to be a huge black eye for the European Tour, but more interesting is the criticism from Rory agent Chubby Chandler regarding George O'Grady's missed opportunity to create a world tour.

Either way, in practical terms at least, Mcilroy's decision won't make that much difference to his relationship with the European Tour. He already plays a dozen or so times on the PGA Tour as a non-member and accepting his card would add only three more tournaments to his annual commitment. Still, such a move would represent a pretty significant symbolic blow to executive director George O'Grady at a time when his schedule for 2010 currently has more holes than the Mission Hills resort in China; and the prize money for the "R2D" has just been cut by 25 percent. Europe's headman has never needed his top boys more than he does right now.

Indeed, there are those who feel that O'Grady has -- credit crunch or not -- missed a trick when it comes to at least tweaking the dominance enjoyed by the PGA Tour and, perhaps even more importantly, giving his members more opportunities to play.

"The financial crisis gave the European Tour a perfect chance to get together with other tours around the world," contends Andrew 'Chubby' Chandler, managing director of International Sports Management, whose clients include McIlroy, Els, Lee Westwood and Darren Clarke. "When everybody was struggling, that was the time to have a go as a global partnership. There were gaps in the schedule.