Harrington asks Tour to 'give back' to Seve

As Severiano Ballesteros remained in an intensive care ward in a Madrid hospital yesterday, Padraig Harrington was 400 miles south here on the Costa del Sol expressing regret that the European Tour has not done enough to recognise the great Spaniard.

"It is a shame that over the last number of years, he has not been leading out the European Tour as an ambassador," said this year's Open champion. "It's only when something like this happens, that you see how much he's missed. Hopefully, going forward, the Tour can build more of a relationship with Seve and have him at the forefront of our Tour."

Ballesteros's plight – as the doctors continue to describe his condition as "stable" after three operations to remove a malignant brain tumour – will inevitably be at the forefront of most of the thoughts here this week at the final staging of the Volvo Masters, the season-ending tournament which his influence did so much to establish.

Next week the Tour enters a new era as the HSBC Champions tournament kick-starts the much-vaunted "Race To Dubai", which will culminate with the $20m (£12.8m) shootout in the Emirates in November 2009. And the Dubliner, who will tomorrow tee off his campaign to overhaul Robert Karlsson and so become the last winner of the old Order of Merit title, believes that, at the very least, Ballesteros's unmistakable image should have been used in the promotion.

Said Harrington: "Is it Harry Vardon we have on our new Tour thing [logo]? Why isn't it Seve? He is the man when you think about it. He is the European Tour, and it is at times like this that you kind of say, well, we wish we had more of Seve."

Despite having hosted his own tournaments and, indeed, having the Seve Trophy named in his honour, Ballesteros's relationship with the Tour has often been strained. When pressed on what form his ambassadorial role might have taken, or still could take, Harrington provided a heartfelt response. "Seve would just have to stand there," he said. "He has that sort of charisma, he just needs to enter a room and everyone knows he is there. It's only now you kind of recognise that an opportunity has been missed to give something back to Seve. Because there's no doubt he brought the Tour an awful lot over the years."