The forceful American victory on the Ryder Cup Whistling Straits’ created cracks in the European team. A veteran contingent traveled to Wisconsin, with four of the twelve players, Westwood, Poulter, Sergio Garcia and Casey, already in their 40s. Of them only Sergio, with three victories in four games, offered his best version.
The truth is that the classification system calls for changes. Harrington had only three personal picks, out of six that allowed his North American counterpart Stricker to better accommodate his squad to the needs of the field. The Irishman took Sergio, Poulter and Lowry, who got five points out of nine European points. But three, as we said, were from García. Poulter only added in the singles, in which he remains undefeated, and Lowry, although he revealed himself as a man who should be important in the team in the future, only won once in three starts. On the other hand, between Spieth, Schauffele, Scheffler, Finau, English and Berger, those chosen by Stricker, they accumulated 11 of the 19 American points.
Beyond this debate, another point that is drawn from this defeat is that part of the generation that has consolidated European dominance in the 21st century (seven wins in ten editions) has already delivered their best golf and young blood is urgently needed. In that sense, two of the players who have the most ballots to be in future editions are the 25-year-old Scotsman Robert MacIntyre and the 20-year-old Danish Nicolaj Hojgaard, junior world champion with Denmark in 2018.
Both already have victories on the European Tour. MacIntyre won in Cyprus last year and Hojgaard won the Italian Open at the beginning of September (a week before his brother Rasmus, another of the future, won in Switzerland, being the first time that two brothers had triumphed in consecutive weeks on the circuit). This last tournament was played precisely at the Marco Simone Golf & Country Club in Rome, which will host the biennial in 2023. “Now I know it quite well. It needs some tinkering to be ready, but it is a good course,” he tells As Hojgaard, that has the Ryder among its “main objectives” in the short term, after failing the cut with +7 in the Andalucía Masters in Valderrama. And as expected, he confirms that, if they coincide with Rasmus on the team, they would ask to play “together”. What do you think of the European performance in Whistling Straits? “They gave everything they had. They were obviously outmatched by the Americans, who were a very strong team. Sometimes it happens,” he says. De Valderrama leaves “disappointed”: “I have enjoyed playing this field. It is complicated but fair. What happens is that I have not played well and it frustrates me. I have not done enough.”
MacIntyre, at +5, narrowly earned the right to play the final two rounds of the tournament. “I’m not happy. I’ve been great off the tee, like most of the year, and that’s the thing to do here, but I’ve kicked terribly both days. I haven’t played well enough. I’ll have to do better tomorrow (for this Saturday) and make a good card, “he commented to As. Asking about Ryder, he confesses that he was” disappointed “a bit not to enter the team for this year. When the selection was closed, he was ninth on the European points list (ahead of Sergio, Poulter and Westwood, whose experience ended up weighing more) and 13th in the world. “I was well positioned at the end of the race to join the team, but this is golf and those who joined formed a great team. It only remains to try again,” he says. “One hundred percent I want to be in Rome in two years. I feel that my game is ready. I just have to improve a couple of things,” he adds.
A special Pro Am with Pau Gasol
MacIntyre had a Pro Am game on Wednesday that he will surely remember for a lifetime. He had to play with Pau Gasol and Luis Figo. “It was wonderful to play with Pau. I have never seen a man so tall and he was a gentleman. He is not only an incredible athlete, he is also a wonderful person. He was very cool,” he enthuses. “This is one of the things that golf has, that you live experiences that you had not even dreamed of. We are very lucky,” he celebrates, although he acknowledges that he is more about football and that he did not stop “asking” things to Figo. “In the Pro Am you play with many different people, with varied histories, and you live great moments,” concludes the southpaw, one of the men destined to defend the European fort in the next Ryder.
