Karrie Webb in danger of missing Olympic golf team after dropping down rankings

IF Australia’s Olympic golf team was picked today the country’s most decorated player would be overlooked for young guns Minjee Lee and Su Oh.

Minjee Lee is a certainty to make the team.

GOLF’S grande dame Karrie Webb is set to be a shock Olympic selection casualty because of young Victorian Su Oh’s stellar rise.

Oh’s breakout finish on Monday with her tie for eighth at the Women’s PGA Championship, near Seattle, has vaulted her ahead of Webb in the Rolex World Rankings for the first time.

Oh (73-69-72-70) closed with a fine one-under-par 70 to finish even-par at Sahalee Country Club, six shots behind Canadian victor Brooke Henderson, who beat world No.1 Lydia Ko in a play-off.

Nervous times for Karrie Webb. Picture: Sarah Reed.

If Australia’s golf team was picked today, Minjee Lee and Oh, both 20, would be packing their bags for Rio and Webb would be heartbroken.

With Lee (world No.13) already a lock on one of Australia’s two women’s berths for the Rio Olympics in August, the race is on between Webb and Oh for the other.

Webb, 41, may have won seven majors but her most recent tournament wins in 2014 at the Women’s Australian Open and Founders Cup have diminished significantly in value for her world ranking.

Webb, back in a tie for 50th, has dropped to No.53 in the updated world rankings while fast-rising Oh has jumped from No.62 to No.40.

Webb has revealed many times that the honour of competing at the Rio Olympics, when golf makes its return, is one of the driving forces in her game.

While some of the best in the men’s game have expressed indifference at golf’s Olympic status, Webb has been bewitched by the opportunity for years.

“When I think about the Olympics, I just think of being part of it, walking out in the opening ceremony with the team, the Olympic village,” Webb once told The Courier-Mail.

Su Oh has stormed past Webb in the rankings.

“I’ve loved the Olympics since I can remember. I remember watching the Moscow Olympics on TV with Mum and Dad (in 1980). Growing up in Australia you realise how big the Olympics are.”

She has had a flat year with only one top 20 finish in the 10 events she has played since her third at the Women’s Australian Open at The Grange in Adelaide.

Webb has four events to flip the rankings picture although realistically she will probably play in just two, possibly, three.

The final golf team for the Olympics will be settled after the US Women’s Open in California (July 7-10), an event she won in 2000 and 2001.

Oh has been a bullet performer by comparison. She started the year with only limited status on the LPGA Tour, soared with a second at the Kingsmill Championship last month and now has her best finish in a major.

Oh has an extra ace in her camp, having recently started working with Victorian product Cameron McCormick, the Texas-based coach of world No. 2 Jordan Spieth.