Matt Fitzpatrick obliges Luke Donald, shows he’s in form for Ryder Cup

Matt Fitzpatrick had reason to be happy about his flight across the Atlantic to his home in Florida. He was chosen for his third straight Ryder Cup team, and he wound up playing a lot of golf to make sure he was part of Team Europe.

Fitzpatrick began to turn his season around when he changed his caddie and his coach, but he didn’t earn one of six automatic spots and was not a sure thing as a captain’s pick.

He played three straight tournaments on the PGA Tour. And then European captain Luke Donald suggested he play back-to-back weeks at the British Masters in England and the European Masters in Switzerland.

“I had a conversation with Luke and said to him: ‘Listen, I know I’ve been playing well, but I’m thinking that I need to manage my schedule here from an energy standpoint. I might miss British Masters and play Switzerland. It just gives me an extra week of kind of rest,’” he said.

Donald asked him to play the British Masters, and Fitzpatrick obliged.

“That was important to him, and obviously that’s important and that’s something that I want to make sure that I’m doing the right thing as well,” Fitzpatrick said.

He tied for sixth at The Belfry. He finished fifth in Switzerland. He’s on the Ryder Cup team.

It was a big climb for Fitzpatrick, who had slipped to No. 85 in the world going into the PGA Championship in May, his best ranking in nearly a year.