Very interesting list! Anyone know anything about this new Korean course? St George's Hill at 77 - big honour for them.
PS - Sheshan? Seriously? I've been there and it is not a bad course it but nowhere near in the league of the other courses on that list.
Does it say anywhere, how the lists were really compiled? Are they using scores from their overseas affiliates' local rankings and trying to fit them together somehow? The order of inclusion for the foreign courses pretty much follows the GOLF DIGEST KOREA, GOLF DIGEST CHINA, GOLF WORLD UK lists [maybe not the latest GOLF WORLD list, I don't know]. Anyway, the main difference between this ranking and the other world rankings [GOLF, LINKS 100, etc.] is the high rankings of a few courses in the Far East that don't show up anywhere at all on other lists ... likely because they are token entries meant to give the local affiliates something to brag about.
I played the one course at Spring City last year and walked the other ... to suggest they are both in the top 100 in the world is to admit that you have no idea what you're talking about. Having those two, and another two in Korea [just coincidentally owned by another big group], raises the possibility that advertising dollars might have played a role. I suppose someone might say the same thing about Barnbougle or Bandon Dunes, but those courses have been ranked highly by everyone else, too.