This year's field will be Australia, China, England, France, India, Ireland, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Paraguay, Scotland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, United States and Zimbabwe.

Countries that participated last year and were not included this year are Argentina, South Korea and Germany. They have been replaced by India, Italy and Paraguay.

India created a big upset the last time they played the tournament in 1996 when they beat Scotland. Leading the charge was Gaurav Ghei who beat the then world No 2 Colin Montgomerie. Jeev Milkha Singh defeated Andrew Colthart. Ali Sher was the third member ofthe team.

A happy Ghei, while welcoming the decision of the tournament committee, said it would be a big boost for the game. ``I think we deserve it. The boys have had so many good results lately, including Jyoti Randhawa's performance at the Hero Honda Masters and the Dubai Creek Classic, Arjun Atwal's Wills Indian Open triumph and Jeev's consistent show in the European PGA. I think they shouldn't have waited this long to invite us back,'' said Ghei who considers that eventful windy day at the Old Course as one of the major highlights of his career.

The format of the tournament remains the same. Three professionals will be representing each country. The 16 teams will be divided into four groups. All the four groups will play round robin league on the first three days. Players selected to represent the countries will be announced by end of August.

South Africa are the defending champions for the last two years and will be looking forward to making it a hat-trick. They beat Spain 3-0 in the final lastyear.