As a distant ancestor of Robert the Bruce, or so he believes, it is tempting to imagine Geoff Ogilvy drawing a claymore instead of a driver from his golf bag and sending the Englishman Paul Casey homeward to think again, just as the old Scottish king did to proud Edward's army all those years ago.

Alas, the modern pair are close friends and residents in Scottsdale near to the course where they contested Sunday's final of the Accenture Matchplay Championship in the Arizona desert, and the flight of fancy doesn't really work. Besides, the 4and3 result, while convincing, was still a closer-run affair.

Ogilvy also claims to be related on his father's side to the late SirAngus Ogilvy, a member of the royal family, but there we must draw the line. The golfer is not a blue-blooded Scot with a claim to the throne but a red-blooded 29-year-old Aussie who is fast becoming a threat to the world golfing crown ofTiger Woods.

Ogilvy swept past Padraig Harrington into the No.4 position yesterday as a result of his second WGC matchplay success and third in total. He defends his WGC-CA Championship title at the Doral Golf Resort and Spa in Florida next week and, with a US Open victory from 2006 also under his belt, he is well on his way, and in thediscipline of strokeplay, too.

Not that you would have thought it from his winner's interview on Sunday. He placed himself in his perceived world order in the group behind Woods, Harrington, Sergio Garcia and Phil Mickelson. When pointed out he was actually fourth, he said simply: "Well, that's nice."

He doesn't give much away, as his opponents in Arizona found outlast week, and he considers himself lucky in particular to have advanced past Shingo Katayama, his second-round opponent who was two up with two to play and lost at the first extra hole.

Casey, who is no mean matchplay exponent himself and a former winner of the European world matchplay title when it was at Wentworth, said: "What is tough about playing Geoff is that he doesn't change. His demeanour doesn't waver, which is a huge attribute, especially in matchplay.

"He walks the same pace, whether he's playing well or poorly. Hemanages himself very, very well, and that's what I felt today. Even when I made birdies, he just sort of laughs at you and carries on with what he's doing. It's Geoff being Geoff, and he's not trying to put that on. It's just the way he is."

Katayama is not the only one whohas discovered how cool he is under pressure. Mickelson and Scotland's Colin Montgomerie are both able to vouch that the Australian kept his head while they were losing theirs over the closing hole at Winged Foot in that USOpen nearly three years ago.

Ogilvy, a product of the highly-rated Victoria Institute of Sport that produced Robert Allenby and Stuart Appleby before him and Aaron Baddeley a few years later, has a different account of his perceived cool-headedness, and assures that it is a developed asset, not a natural one.

By his own account he used to have a negative attitude on the golf course and, in trying times, would openly display the kind of exasperation that gives opponents a lift.

"I think I have made a concerted effort to stay on an even keel in matchplay," he said. "It's much more important, I think, than it is in strokeplay because, when you're playing next to 156 other guys, they don't give two hoots about what you feel about your 8-iron into the fourth hole.

"But when you're playing the guy right there, a lot of matchplay is feeling like you're beating him, and it is under your control not to let him feel like that. If you behave like he's getting to you, that's going to make him play better, potentially.

So it's definitely a concerted effort not to let the guy know what's going on inside my head."

Generally speaking, it is a Scottish trait to walk the fairways as if the world is against us when things are not going our way and Ogilvy, whose temperament in reality might be less even than it appears, is a good example of the benefits of shrugging off the gloom.

That's not to say personality should be stifled and, in that respect, Ogilvy still looks up to countryman Greg Norman.

"There's no next Greg Norman," he said in response to suggestions that it might be him. "There just won't be. Even if Greg was ranked 10th in the world in his heyday, he'd still have been big time because he's that type of personality. You either have charisma or you don't. Ithink he had it more than most people have ever had it, Arnold Palmer-like. Like, just walk into a room and you can tell he's there. Hejust had something."

Ogilvy has something, too. Despite his fine ancestry, his professional visits to Scotland have been rare, but there is a joint fifth place in the 2005 Open Championship at St Andrews to his credit, and there will be a chance to see him in July this year at Turnberry, and to experience some of those positive vibes that might just date back, in a genealogical sense, to Bannockburn and 1314.