Golf: O'Grady urges top Scots golfers on to home win at Castle Stuart

World No.?1 Luke Donald leads the line-up on the banks of the Moray Firth, but the Englishman faces stiff competition for a 500,000 first prize from the likes of Lee Westwood, Graeme McDowell and Phil Mickelson.

Former major winners Ernie Els, Retief Goosen and Angel Cabrera are also in the field, making it a mouth-watering event for the thousands of fans heading north up the A9 over the next few days.

O'Grady is confident the new venue is up to the task of hosting one of the European Tour's biggest events.

And, having just seen Thomas Levet thrill the French crowds by winning his home Open, he would love to see one of the Scots do likewise this week.

"You have a crop of nearly players, the likes of Stephen Gallacher and David Drysdale, for instance, in Scotland defined merely by players winning at the absolute top level," said O'Grady.

"Martin Laird has chosen his own way to the top by joining the PGA Tour. I spoke to him at the Cadillac Championship, the week after he'd won at Bay Hill, and he could be Scotland's Tiger Woods.

"There's certainly a lot of initiatives, whether it's the SGU, Team Scottish Hydro or clubgolf, in Scotland."

England may currently provide the top two players in the world in Donald and Westwood while Northern Ireland has produced the last two US Open champions in McDowell and Rory McIlroy.

But, when it comes to staging tournaments, O'Grady admitted the home of golf continues to prove the most popular with sponsors in the UK. "At the moment the Irish are fairly bouyant and rightly so, but, at the same time, we are fighting hard to keep tournament golf alive over there whereas that is pretty strong up here (in Scotland]," he added.

"By making Loch Lomond so impressive, (former owner] Lyle Anderson basically unearthed Barclays in the shape of Bob Diamond to come to us and they will tell you it has been very good business for various divisions of Barclays."

The move to Castle Stuart may have been viewed as a gamble by some, but bumper crowds are expected as the Highlands plays host to its biggest-ever sporting event. "The north of Scotland has a great golfing heritage," said Ian Stuart, head of Barclays Corporate UK. "It is fresh and I think every tournament needs a bit of dusting off from time to time.

"We are really confident about the move - everything is set up to make it a great tournament. The European Tour do things very well and 99 per cent of the risk will be taken out of it."

The Renaissance Club in East Lothian lost out to Castle Stuart in the battle to stage the event, with the Inverness course likely to be the venue for another two years. It has been suggested the Scottish Open will then start to move around the country, but O'Grady revealed he has not received any recent contact from Donald Trump regarding his championship course outside Aberdeen.

"No approach has been made by the Trump organisation about staging the Scottish Open," he said. "I spoke to one of the executives when they were going for planning permission, but since it started to be built I've not had any direct contact. Mr Trump's reputation goes ahead of him and I think they wanted to make us aware they were planning to build a golf course they felt could host Open Championships or Ryder Cups.

"We would look at any golf course with the potential, but, at the moment, any decisions about the Scottish Open are made by us and Barclays together. However, if asked we would certainly look at it."

On the possibility of the Trump course being a potential Ryder Cup course in the future, the Irishman added: "It is well known that we offered to take the Ryder Cup to the Continent of Europe, but they (the Trump organisation] know where we are. The Ryder Cup is committed to 2018 and no discussions have taken place yet about 2022."