“I am now ready to play again,” – the words echo like music in the ears of golf fans worldwide as Tiger Woods, the athlete poised to become the greatest player golf has ever seen, reports that he’ll be defending his title in Tucson next week.

Of all the professional golf tournaments Tiger Woods could have selected to stage his colossal return to the game and his continued and inevitable domination over the sport – he chose Arizona. The Arizona-hosted World Golf Championships- Accenture Match Play Championship will be Tiger’s first competitive tournament since his U.S. Open victory at Torrey Pines last June. Having spent the past eight months rehabbing his knee, anyone with even the mildest interest in golf is curious about his condition and quality of play upon his return.

While the golf world is abuzz with the release of the news just a few hours ago, it is especially meaningful to Arizonans and even more so to Tucsonans, who I am sure are now re-working their plans for February 26- March 1 to accommodate some Tiger-watching time.

Adding yet another dimension to the return of golf’s mega-watt star is the fact that the Accenture Match Play will showcase the world’s top talent on the ultra-fresh fairways of the Ritz Carlton Golf Club, Dove Mountain in Marana, Arizona. Revealed to the public a little over a month ago on January 17th, the fairways at Ritz Golf Club are primed and prepared to stage the most-anticipated tournament of the 2009 season so far. Tiger’s presence there is just icing on the cake. I imagine tournament coordinators are toasting to Tiger as I write.

Also in the field will be Camilo Villegas and Anthony Kim, the two young guns who have taken advantage of Woods’s absent status. Aside from Tiger, I’ll be watching out for Rory McIlroy, the 19-year-old Irishman, who enjoyed victory at the Dubai Desert Classic earlier this season and is currently ranked 16th on the Official World Golf Rankings. Three-time Major champion Padraig Harrington, also an Irishman and ranked 3rd on the World Golf Rankings, will be onsite at Accenture as well. And the field also includes Sergio Garcia who has yet to play on American soil this season while instead concentrating on several European Tour starts.

Of the top 64 players invited to the match-play format, 17 hail from the United States, eight each from Australia and South Africa and seven from England. Other countries represented are Colombia, Fiji, Germany, India, Ireland, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Argentina, Canada, Denmark, Spain and Sweden.

www.worldgolfchampionships.com.

- Nichole Brophy, Golf Editor.

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