(Reuters) - Swede Henrik Stenson, ousted at the top of The European Tour Order of Merit by Open Champion Padraig Harrington on Sunday, is determined to recapture top spot.
Harrington, who beat Sergio Garcia in a four-hole play-off at Carnoustie last week, is not taking part in the Deutsche Bank Players Championship of Europe, which begins at the Gut Kaden course outside Hamburg on Thursday.
World Number Nine Stenson has now slipped 326,199 euros behind the Irishman but with a €600,000 first prize at this week's Deustche Bank Players' Championship of Europe at Gut Kaden Stenson can regain top place.
"I put myself in a good position with the win in Dubai and the WGC Accenture Match Play but it needs a whole lot more than that to be Number One at the end of the year," Stenson said: "I'm not far behind Padraig and I just have to get my game in shape, come up with a couple of good weeks to challenge him again."
This week's event could prove a battle of Swedes.
Fellow-countryman Niclas Fasth, the recent BMW International Open winner and third on the Order of Merit, could go top with victory and he wants be there or thereabouts come October at the seasonending event, the Volvo Masters.
"It would naturally be my goal to win again this year," Fasth, "and if I could manage to pull off a big one, then I would be in the hunt."
Compatriot Robert Karlsson, the defending champion, is another with designs on the first prize, but all three Swedes could face a stiff examination in the event Fasth won in 2005.
South Africans Retief Goosen, the World Number 14, and Rory Sabbatini, World Number 16, are in the field.
Their regular US PGA Tour fellow pros, 2006 Ryder Cup player Brett Wetterich, J.B. Holmes, Matt Kuchar, Charley Hoffman and Rod Pampling also tee up at Gut Kaden.
Argentine Andres Romero, leading The Open as late as the 17th last Sunday, seeks his maiden European Tour title.
Germany's favourite golfing son, Bernhard Langer, was forced to withdraw on the eve of the event after undergoing a kidney operation.
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