The DP World Tour made an exception to its rules to allow Austria's Sepp Straka to keep his tour card for next season in the wake of a family emergency.

Straka's wife Paige gave birth to their son, Thomas, prematurely in August, and the baby has remained in the hospital for the first two months of his life.

Straka took time away from competitive golf in the first days of his son's life, withdrawing from the PGA Tour's BMW Championship (the second leg of the FedEx Cup playoffs) and the DP World Tour's BMW PGA Championship in September. He was the only member of the European Ryder Cup team to skip that event in the weeks leading up to the team competition on Long Island.

Now, Straka has had to withdraw from the final two events of the DP World Tour season, the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship

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