Major champions, Ryder Cup captains, amateurs, club pros .
. . there's even a Barclays Premier League footballer in the mix. It can only mean one thing. Open Championship qualifying is upon us.
Today at Sunningdale, Jose Maria Olazabal and Colin Montgomerie will be among those battling it out over 36 holes in the European leg of international final qualifying for direct entry into next month's championship at Royal Lytham and St Annes.
The longer regional qualifying road to the world's oldest major starts at 14 clubs across the UK and Ireland with some 1400 hopefuls, including West Ham United midfielder Gary O'Neil.
The Sunningdale shoot-out has 96 players competing for around 10 Lytham spots on offer. Olazabal, the double Masters champion and current European Ryder Cup captain, and Montgomerie, who last year missed out on an Open place for the first time since 1990, join a line-up that includes Paul McGinley, Rich Beem and Niclas Fasth.
Marc Warren, who qualified for the US Open last month, and Stephen Gallacher, a winner of the Lytham Trophy as an amateur back in 1995, join Monty in an eight-strong Scottish posse.
The 18-hole regional qualifiers offer the leading finishers at each venue a place in next month's local final qualifying competition. The Scottish venue is Bruntsfield Links in Edinburgh where former Scottish amateur champion and rookie pro David Law joins a field including another newcomer to the paid ranks in Ian Redford, the former Rangers player, who earlier this year took the professional plunge aged 51.
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