When Paul Casey severely injured rib muscles while practising for the Open Championship at Turnberry in July, he was leading the standings in the European Tour’s Race to Dubai and was ranked at No 3 in the world. Since then, he has hardly been seen.

The Englishman has not played a full competitive round of golf since Turnberry but will return to action today in the newly sponsored and revamped Volvo World Match Play Championship at the Finca Cortesin Golf Club, 60 miles west of Málaga. It is as far removed from Wentworth, the traditional home of the event, as could be imagined.

To his surprise, Casey has fallen only one place in the world rankings in the interim and has been overtaken in the European standings by only three others — Lee Westwood, Martin Kaymer and Rory McIlroy. All are among the 16-man field here and all have their eyes on finishing the season as Europe’s No 1. With four big-money events left, it should prove a tense and exciting run-in.

For Casey, however, nothing is certain. He hopes that he is over the worst of his injury but will find out only in the heat of competition. And if his injury flares up again, he will have no hesitation in pulling out. “One sharp pain and I’ll be out of here,” he said yesterday after an excruciatingly long 5½-hour pro-am round over what must be the hilliest and toughest walking course on tour.

“It still hurts, but I don’t think I’m going to do too much damage this week,” Casey said. “I’m on anti- inflammatories, but I don’t want to mask it [the pain] too much because I have to pay attention to what my body is telling me.”

Casey — who has won three times this season, twice on the European Tour and once in the United States — has spent most of the past ten weeks bored, having treatment, hitting a few chips and killing time at home in Scottsdale, Arizona. He won this event at Wentworth in 2006, and with it what was then a £1 million first prize, and generally revels in matchplay golf, a form of the game that rewards his aggressive, big-hitting style.

“It’s not strokeplay, so I can get away with the odd bad shot,” he said. “I’m here because I feel I’ve got a chance to win this thing.”

What the 32-year-old Englishman had not reckoned on, though, was such a loss of distance on his shots. This course will particularly favour the long hitters because it has little rough, the par fives are reachable in two for some and a number of the par fours are within striking distance off the tee.

At present that part of Casey’s game has been emasculated. “Have I lost distance? Yeah. It’s off by at least 5 per cent,” he said. “Where a seven-iron would normally go 180 yards, now it’s in the low 170s.” At least he is laughing. In practice on Tuesday he hit a driver into the wind a puny 270 yards and had to put up with a bit of ribbing (no pun intended) from his caddie.

While Casey is easing himself back in, Westwood is in top form and looking to pull away from the chasing pack. He finished No 1 in Europe in 2000, won this event the same year, and has arrived here on the back of victory at the Portugal Masters.

While he believes that the 2009 version of himself would beat the 2000 model, he is trying to rediscover the fearlessness of youth. “All around I’m a better player,” the 36-year-old said. “[But] I would like to have that confidence and arrogance that I had when I was younger, when I turned up to tournaments slightly more bulletproof.

“I had that fearless approach more than ten years ago which made it easier for me to win on a regular basis. I’m trying to get that back now, that habit of turning up almost cocky.”

One such player is McIlroy. His confidence knows no bounds and, if all goes well, he could be going head to head with Westwood in one of the semi-finals on Saturday. The other mouthwatering prospect would match Casey against Sergio García. First, though, each player must play three others in a round-robin format to qualify for the 36-hole knockout stage.

New format for matchplay event

Players have been divided into four groups of four, seeded according to world rankings. Each player will play three rounds of matchplay over 18 holes in a round-robin format.

In the event of a tie, the total number of holes won will be used to determine who goes through to the 36-hole semi-finals on Saturday.

Players have been divided into four groups of four, seeded according to world rankings. Each player will play three rounds of matchplay over 18 holes in a round-robin format.

In the event of a tie, the total number of holes won will be used to determine who goes through to the 36-hole semi-finals on Saturday.

How they line up: Group A: P Casey (GB), R Goosen (SA), A Kim (US), S Strange (Aus). Group B: S García (Sp), M Kaymer (Ger), R Allenby (Aus), O Wilson. (GB). Group C: H Stenson (Swe), R McIlroy (GB), Á Cabrera (Arg), S Dyson (GB). Group D: L Westwood (GB), C Villegas (Col), R Fisher (GB), J M Singh (India).

Semi-final line-up: Group A winner v group B winner; Group C winner v group D winner.

Prize money: tournament winner gets €750,000 (about £671,000); fourth in group gets €120,000