At this time of the year, the maxim for Ireland's touring professionals appears to be to follow the sun. Such a view is certainly reflected this week with five Irish players scheduled for competitive action on tours on three different continents, none of them Europe.

Darren Clarke and Paul McGinley have remained in South Africa for the Dimension Data Pro-Am in Sun City, an event which is part of that country's Sunshine Tour; David Higgins and Ronan Rafferty are playing in the Heineken Classic at the Vines resort in Perth, Western Australia, in a co-sanctioned European Tour/Australasian Tour event, and Richie Coughlan resumes action on the US Tour at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

The ISM stable, subject of a multi-million pounds takeover yesterday, are in South Africa in force. Apart from Clarke and McGinley, the tournament also sees Lee Westwood make his seasonal debut - although he won't start the defence of his European Tour Order of Merit title until the Dubai Desert Classic in March - while Andrew Coltart is also competing.

Clarke, for one, won't want a repeat of his season-opening scoring in last week's South African Open, won by Mark McNulty, when he missed the cut by 10 shots. Apart from the fact Dimension Data are his main sponsors, and obviously expecting a good show from their man, Clarke is familiar with the Sun City course from playing in the Million Dollar Challenge in recent years and will hope his game is sharper after ridding the cobwebs from the system.

McGinley's early-season stint in South Africa hasn't been as productive as he would like, certainly in terms of building on his Ryder Cup aspirations. He made the cut in his two tournaments but failed to challenge for the title, and the consequence is that he has only improved one place in the European Ryder Cup table from 13th to 12th.

In terms of boosting his world ranking position, the past few weeks have been disappointing in that McGinley, back to 71st in the list after the South African Open, is some way from the top-50 place he needs by the first week in March if he is to be added to the US Masters invitation list.

The goals of Higgins are some way removed from the loftier targets of McGinley, but his two-week stint in South Africa was productive in that he made two cuts from two starts which moved Higgins to 66th in the money list.

Higgins's determination to accumulate as much money as possible early-on in the season is shown by his decision to continue his globe-trotting to Australia for this week's Heineken Classic where he will be joined in the field by Rafferty. Rafferty competed in the Canon Challenge in Sydney last weekend and, although he failed to seriously challenge for a title won by New Zealander David Smail, he had three sub-par rounds on his way to a 72-holes aggregate 283 and tied-43rd position.

Meanwhile, Coughlan's failure to get into the field for the Phoenix Open on the US Tour last weekend meant he was leapfrogged by 15 players on the money list and dropped from 119th place to tied-134th. The 26-year-old has an opportunity to add to his bank balance this week, however, as he is guaranteed a starting place in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am which is played over three courses (Pebble Beach, Spyglass and Poppy Hills).

While Clarke last week indicated he would probably play an increasing number of tournaments in the US this year, the inclusion of no less than 13 Europeans in the field for Pebble Beach demonstrates the allure that tour already holds for many of his contemporaries.

Among the European contingent this week is Paul Casey, a member of the Britain and Ireland Walker Cup winning team in 1999, who is making his Tour debut on a sponsor's invite after turning professional before Christmas.