A brilliant birdie at the last hole gave former Ryder Cup player Jose Rivero, pictured, a dramatic one-shot victory in the FIRSTPLUS Wales Seniors Open at The Vale Resort yesterday.

Rivero had started the final round six strokes back but as the leaders faltered over the back nine of the Wales National Course, the Spaniard went on a birdie spree for a round of 68 and a winning total of four under par 212.

Sam Torrance of Scotland, who closed with a 71, overnight leader David J Russell of England (75), Juan Quiros of Spain (69) and Frenchman Gery Watine (70) shared second place on 213.

Rivero looked to have blown his chance when he bogeyed the 17th but the 50-year-old, a member of triumphant Ryder Cup Teams in 1985 and 1987, responded by hitting a nine iron to 12ft at the last and holing the putt for a career-best cheque of £75,000.

'Before starting my final round I did not think I could win from six shots back. I thought if I played very good and got to four under I would at best finish second,' said Rivero.

The changing face of Chicago golf will be evident in the next few weeks, with the Western Golf Association slated to announce a new title sponsor for the Western Open, expected to be BMW, next Monday. Two days later, the PGA Tour will announce the format for its new FedEx Cup series that will move the Western to September dates beginning in 2007 and rotate it to other Midwestern cities after that.

In the meantime, Kemper Sports Management is offering a special treat Tuesday. KSM had planned a low-key exhibition by Arnold Palmer to spotlight the opening of Hawthorn Woods Country Club. But after contemplating that Palmer, 76, might not be making any more such appearances in the area, KSM has opened the event to the public.

Palmer will give a clinic at 10:45 a.m. on the club's practice range, then play the back nine of the course, which he designed with partner Ed Seay, starting at 11:15. Spectators are invited to walk along with the seven-time major champion, who has no other design projects in the works in Chicago.

Palmer, though, doesn't appear on the brink of retirement. He recently announced he will assume full authority of his 35-year-old course architecture business, a decision made in part because of an illness to Seay, his partner since 1971. Palmer is relocating his firm from Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., to Palmer's Bay Hill Club in Orlando, Fla.

Hawthorn Woods, a private club that is the centerpiece for a new residential community, is one of nearly 300 active projects that Palmer's firm has going in 38 states and 23 countries. One of his courses, the K Club in Ireland, will be the site of the Ryder Cup matches in September.

As for the Western, the PGA Tour's second-oldest event behind the U.S. Open is expected to be renamed the BMW Championship for 2007. It will shift to September as one of four tournaments in the new FedEx Cup series, a NASCAR-style concept devised to boost the tour's fall TV ratings.

WGA tournament director John Kaczkowski expects Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh and defending champion Jim Furyk in this year's field, though all haven't formally committed.

"This will be the best field we've had in a number of years,'' Kaczkowski said.

Kaczkowski also revealed four of the sponsor's exemptions into the Western field. Two were automatic: Western Amateur champion Jamie Lovemark and LaSalle Bank Open winner Jason Dufner. Lovemark, 17, is a freshman at USC and the youngest champion in the history of the prestigious Western Am. Dufner enjoyed a carryover from his victory at The Glen Club, surviving the cut in the U.S. Open for the first time in his career and finishing in a tie for 40th.

Also getting Western invites were Mark Wilson, a PGA Tour player who has established residence in Chicago, and Billy Hurley, a member of the victorious U.S. Walker Cup team last summer at Chicago Golf Club who recently turned pro. A 2004 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Hurley is squeezing in tournaments between his military duties. He made the cut in the Bay Hill Invitational and also played in the Byron Nelson Championship

For a man who gives everything and more for his team-mates it is

perplexing Colin Montgomerie cannot do it for himself.

Another near miss at the US Open on Sunday was Monty's fifth second place in a major - one record the Scot does not want in his bag.

In a way it is remarkable he got himself into such a position again as his chances of winning one golf's elite tournaments had been written off years ago.

But on the other hand, his double-bogey six at the 72nd hole having just a seven iron in his hands for his approach will perpetuate the assumption that Montgomerie just does not have the bottle for the big occasion.

Yet in the sport's biggest test, the Ryder Cup, the 42-year-old becomes a mountain of a man.

He has yet to lose any of his seven singles matches, winning five, and in 32 rounds at seven Ryder Cups he has won 21 points.

That is only bettered by Nick Faldo, Bernhard Langer and Seve Ballesteros.

Monty will be remembered for being the man who holed the putt to win the Ryder Cup at Oakland Hills in 2004.

Unfortunately, he will also be remembered for not winning a major, for surely his final chance has slipped through his fingers.

After twice losing play-offs in the US Open and US PGA in the mid 1990s and then faltering at the last to finish second in the US PGA in 1997 - all while he was in his pomp - no-one believed Montgomerie would be a contender again.

But credit must go to the belief and strength he showed to arrest his slide, which saw him plummet to 84th in the world 17 months ago.

He ran Tiger Woods a close second in the Open at St Andrews last year and his Indian summer ended with a record eighth European Order of Merit title.

However, golf is becoming a younger man's game - Vijay Singh was the last major winner over 40 when he won the 2004 US PGA six months before his 42nd birthday - and Montgomerie will be 43 on Friday

Julius Boros is the oldest winner of a major at the age of 48 but that was the 1968 US PGA and the physical demands of the game have come on leaps and bounds since then.

The ticking of the clock must almost be as loud for Montgomerie as the echoes in his major trophy room.