Eleven Australian courses have been named in Golf Digest’s biennial listing of the world’s top 100.

Royal Melbourne’s famous west course tops the local list at No. 4 in the ranking, which is for courses outside the United States.

Golf Digest does not rank Royal Melbourne’s composite course – a collection of holes from the West and East courses generally used for tournaments – otherwise it might well reach a No.1 world ranking.

That honour belongs to Royal County Down in Northern Ireland again.

Six Australian golf courses made the top 20 in the world. The eyebrow-raising omission was Peninsula Kingswood Country Golf Club outside Melbourne, which has had one of its courses (North) ranked well inside the top 10 in Australia in recent lists, since the renovation performed by OCM in 2019.

Scotland has 17 courses in the top 100, England 13 and Canada 12. They are the only countries ahead of Australia’s 11.

The list is compiled by a group of 350 panelists, all of whom live outside America.

AUSTRALIAN COURSES RANKED IN THE TOP 100

• 4 - Royal Melbourne (West)

• 11 - Kingston Heath

• 12 - Cape Wickham

• 14 - New South Wales

• 16 - Barnbougle Dunes

• 19 - Royal Melbourne (East)

• 37 - Lost Farm

• 57 - Victoria

• 58 - Metropolitan

• 70 - Royal Adelaide

• 80 - The National (Moonah)