Angel Cabrera and Andres Romero will reinforce the strength of The European Tour’s relationship with Argentine golf by competing at the forthcoming Abierto Visa de la Republica – the first of two Argentine Opens to feature on the 2008 Challenge Tour Schedule.

US Open Champion Cabrera and Andres Romero, winner of The Deutsche Bank Players’ Championship of Europe, have committed to play at the famous Buenos Aires Golf Club from December 6-9, 2007, the scene of Tiger Woods and David Duval’s World Cup victory for the United States in the year 2000.

The 2008 edition of the Abierto Visa de la Republica will be staged just five months later, from April 3-6, at the Hurlingham Golf Club, where Cabrera won his second National Open Championship in 2002.

While the main reason for having two editions of the Abierto Visa de la Republica in the space of five months is down to the long-term restructuring in the Schedules of both the Challenge Tour and Asociación Argentina de Golf (AAG), the fact that both events will feature on the 2008 Challenge Tour Schedule is symbolic of the special relationship between Argentina and The European and Challenge Tours.

Ricardo Gonzalez, Eduardo Romero and Cabrera have been committed supporters of The European Tour throughout their distinguished careers, while Andres Romero is the perfect example of what Argentine golfers can achieve in the modern structure of European golf.

In that modern structure, the Challenge Tour’s partnership with both the AAG and the Tour de las Americas (TLA), and their resulting series’ of co-sanctioned events, offers hundreds of Argentine and Latin American players an avenue to The European Tour.

Encouraged by his performances during the co-sanctioned tournaments in Mexico, Panama, Peru, Costa Rica and Guatemala, Andres Romero made his way to Europe and won his place on The European Tour with a 14th place finish on the 2005 Challenge Tour Rankings.

Andres Romero is one of five Argentine players who have joined the European Tour via the Challenge Tour Rankings since the first co-sanctioned events with the TLA in 2003. Of those five, Daniel Vancsik and Romero have gone on to win on The European Tour.

Alain de Soultrait, Director of the European Challenge Tour, said: “It is a great honour for the Challenge Tour to be involved in as prestigious a championship as the Abierto Visa de la Republica.

“The relationship between Argentina’s best players and The European and Challenge Tours has become a formidable partnership, and we are delighted to further strengthen that bond by being involved in two editions of the Abierto Visa de la Republica in one season.”

For further information, contact:
Communications Division
The European Tour
Tel: +44 (0) 1344 840400
Fax: +44 (0) 1344 840444
Email: media@europeantour.com

Roddy Williams
Senior Press Officer and Website Editor
Tel: +44 1344 840400
Mobile: +44 7899 940029