Korean Tour’s only match play to start on 1 June… with new rules for the ‘trivial’
The Descente Korea Matchplay, the only match-play event on the Korean Professional Golf Association (KPGA) Korean Tour with a total prize fund of 800 million won, will introduce a new way to determine the winner.
The Descente Korea Matchplay will be held at Kingsdale GC (Par 72) in Cheongju, Chungcheongbuk-do, from the 1st to the 4th of next month.메이저놀이터
Until last year, the rankings were determined by the total number of wins by the players in the round of 16 and the number of points scored on each hole, which led to some upsets when the player with the most wins did not win the title.
This year, the format is completely different. The 64 players will be divided into 16 groups and play a group stage to determine the round of 16. From there, the tournament will be a true head-to-head competition to crown a winner.
In the group stage, a win is worth two points, a draw is worth one point, and a loss is worth nothing. In the event of a tie for first place, the tournament will go into sudden death overtime.
To add to the excitement, the quarter-finalists will play a ranking match. Players who don’t make it to the final will also play a third or fourth place match.
On 1 June, two group stage matches will be played in one day. On 2 June, three group matches will determine the round of 16. On 3 June, the round of 16 and quarter-finals will be played together. On 4 June, the semi-finals will be played in the morning and the final game for the championship will be played in the afternoon.
The 64 players have been allocated into five seeding groups. Seeded A are the winners of the 2022 KPGA Korean Tour (15 players). Seeded B are the 2023 KPGA Korean Tour winners (3), and Seeded C are the 2022 Genesis Points leaders (13). The D-seeded group is comprised of recommended players (1) and the E-seeded group is comprised of round of 64 qualifiers (32).
In the A-seeded group, last year’s Genesis Point leader Kim Young-soo should have been seeded first, but he is unable to attend the tournament. As a result, Seo Yoseop, who finished second in the Genesis Points, is the No. 1 seed. Jang Hee-min, who had the lowest Genesis Point among last year’s winners, is seeded 15th.
The B-seeded group, which includes this year’s winners, will be seeded in the order of their victories. Defending champion Go Gun-taek is seeded 16, SK Telecom Open winner Baek Seok-hyun is seeded 17 and Kim Dong-min, who won the KB Financial Live Championship last week, is seeded 18.
Jo Woo-young, who won the Golf Zone Open in Jeju as an amateur, Korea Championship winner Pablo Larrazabal, GS Caltex Mae Kyung Open champion Chung Chan-min and Woori Financial Championship winner Lim Sung-jae will not compete.
The C-seeded group are the 2022 Genesis Points leaders, excluding players in the A and B-seeded groups. The D-seeded group will be the organisers’ pick, Lee Jae-kyung, and the E-seeded group will be seeded from 33 to 64 in order of their ranking in the round of 64.
The tournament will be broadcast live from the round of 64 to the final on SBS Golf 2, the KPGA’s official broadcaster. SBS Golf 2 is available on GENIE TV 992, LGU+ 99, SKB 969 and SkyLife 219 via satellite.