Singh gives Cejka a Wentworth lesson

Alex Cejka and Fredrik Jacobson made short and not so sweet appearances at the World Match Play Championship at Wentworth on Thursday before exiting after hefty first round defeats at the hands of Vijay Singh and Chad Campbell.

Germany's Cejka played some of the poorest golf of an otherwise stellar year which has taken him from the status of relative journeyman to serious major title contender. He lost 8&7 to Fiji's Singh after 29 of the scheduled 36 holes.

Jacobson, a Swede who has similarly improved his reputation this year with top 10 finishes in the U.S. and British opens, was also dispatched without mercy by American Campbell 6&5.

Singh was delighted with his performance but disappointed that as world number three and a former winner (1997) he was not seeded and so had to negotiate Thursday's first hurdle.

"I would have preferred not to have had to play today, put it that way," he told a news conference. "You have to play two rounds a day so it's a tough week - and I'm not getting any younger," said the 40-year-old.

Cejka and Jacobson had won their place in a 12-man field hopeful of scooping a European record one million pounds ($1.67 million) first prize, also the biggest golf jackpot in the world this year after the Sun City Challenge dropped its top cheque to $1.2million from $2million.

Instead they departed Wentworth's West Course 75,000 pounds the richer, their share of a 2.3 million pounds prize pot as first day losers.

Cejka and Jacobson left Dane Thomas Bjorn as the sole surviving European representative after he beat American Len Mattiace 4&3 to secure a second round appointment with U.S. Masters champion Mike Weir.

In the other first round match, South African Tim Clark beat Australia's Stephen Leaney 3&2 having taken 28 holes to lead for the first time. Clark next faces holder and countryman Ernie Els on Friday, the first time they have been paired together in competitive play.

Singh tackles fourth seed Shaun Micheel, the U.S. PGA champion, in the second round and Campbell takes on British Open winner Ben Curtis.

The field is based on performance in golf's four majors rather than invitation for the first time since the annual autumnal match play tournament was launched in 1964.

Frustratingly for the organisers, it has resulted in a field missing the usual liberal scattering of golf's biggest names after a year of major championship shocks.

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