Sergio Garcia withdrew from this week’s DP World Tour event after being passed over for a Ryder Cup captain’s pick.
He’ll instead remain in the U.S., playing golf on Wednesday with tennis star and fellow Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz.
Garcia, 45, told GolfMagic that his decision to pull out of the Amgen Irish Open, which begins Thursday at the K Club in Straffan, Ireland, was a direct result of not making European captain Luke Donald’s 12-man side. Garcia, Europe’s all-time points earner, wasn’t believed to be among the serious contenders for one of six picks after the year in which he didn’t post a top-30 finish in a major and placed outside the top 10 in eight of 10 LIV starts following his victory in Hong Kong in early March.
A member of 10 previous European Ryder Cup teams, though not since 2021, Garcia did receive a call from Donald, he says, which went “fine, but not the call I wanted.”
“I felt like I was so looking forward to being a part of that team, and so I felt like mentally, you know, mentally it was kind of tough,” Garcia told GolfMagic. “I didn’t want to go there [to Ireland] and not be fully engaged in the tournament and stuff, so I just decided to take a little bit of time off and spend it with the family and do a couple of things, you know, some things outside of golf and just kind of reboot a little bit, recharge the batteries.”
Garcia was in Queens on Tuesday for Alcaraz’s straight-sets victory over Jiří Lehečka in the U.S. Open quarterfinals. After his victory, Alcaraz told the on-court interviewer that he was planning to play golf with Garcia on Wednesday morning.
“We’ll discuss tomorrow, but he has to give me at least between 10 and 15 shots at least,” Alcaraz said as the television camera panned to a laughing Garcia and Garcia’s wife, Angela. “… I’m not that good, Sergio, c’mon.”
Garcia has still made just one DP World Tour start this year, missing the cut at the BMW International Open earlier this summer. With LIV’s season complete, it’s unclear when Garcia will return to action.
“Now, the only thing I can do is support the team from home,” Garcia added. “It’s as simple as that. I’ll be watching and cheering on the European team.”
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