The Accenture Match Play Championship, the first World Golf Championships event of the 2012 season, returns to The Ritz-Carlton Golf Club, Dove Mountain. The top 64 players in the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR) as of Monday, February 13, will qualify.

Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Rory McIlroy, and Martin Kaymer, Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4 respectively, lead the list of those who have qualified for next week’s World Golf Championships – Accenture Match Play Championship. Click here to view the top 64 in the OWGR who have qualified for the event.

This year new rules have been put in place, as the Accenture Match Play Championship bracket will be based off the OWGR as of the Monday of championship week, February 20th, as opposed to the OWGR at the time the field is finalised. This modification was made to ensure players are seeded based upon their most current ranking position, for example, while Westwood has moved to No. 2 with his T2 at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic, just fractions ahead of McIlroy, the next week the two are projected to again swap positions with McIlroy taking the No. 2 seed and Westwood falling to No. 3.

What do you think of these new rule changes? Below we have included a video with the highlights from the 2011 Accenture World Match Championships, enjoy!