Browsing: Ryder

The president of the PGA of America, who had initially dismissed abuse directed at Europe’s players during this year’s Ryder Cup as no worse than at “a youth soccer gameâ€, has issued an apology.

“Let me begin with what we must own. While the competition was spirited – especially with the US team’s rally on Sunday afternoon – some fan behavior clearly crossed the line,†Don Rea Jr wrote in an email to PGA of America members. “It was disrespectful, inappropriate, and not representative of who we are as the PGA of America or as PGA of America golf professionals. We condemn that behavior unequivocally.â€

During last week’s tournament, Europe’s players were subjected to vitriolic abuse. An MC at the event resigned after she led chants of “Fuck you, Rory†aimed at Rory McIlroy, the crowd hurled homophobic slurs at golfers and players’ wives were insulted. McIlroy said his wife, Erica, was hit by a beer that was thrown during Saturday afternoon’s play. Europe won the Ryder Cup on Sunday after completing a 15-13 victory.

However, in a BBC interview on Sunday morning, Rea seemed to minimise the abuse. “You’ve got 50,000 people here that are really excited, and heck, you could go to a youth soccer game and get some people who say the wrong things,†he said. He went on to say the behavior was distracting American players because they had to spend energy helping to control the crowd.

The abuse was such that McIlroy began pushing back, telling one spectator to “shut the fuck up†during a foursomes match on Saturday morning.

Rea also said during his BBC interview when asked about the abuse hurled toward McIlroy, “I haven’t heard some of that. I’m sure it happened. It happens when we’re over in Rome on the other side, and Rory understands. Things like that are going to happen.â€

Europe’s Matt Fitzpatrick said about the Rome reference, “It’s pretty offensive to European fans the fact that he said that, really.†Lowry said the level of abuse directed at McIlroy’s wife was “astonishing.â€

Derek Sprague, the CEO at the PGA of America, said on Tuesday that spectators crossed the line and that he planned to apologize personally to Rory McIlroy and Erica McIlroy, who formerly worked at the PGA.

“Rory might have been a target because of how good he is, but the entire European team should not have been subjected to that,†Sprague said on the Golf Channel. “I feel badly and I plan on apologizing to them.â€

Rea also took heat for an awkward trophy presentation on Sunday in which he mentioned Europe had retained the cup, instead of winning it.

On Tuesday, on his LinkedIn page, Rea wrote: “I’m personally taking some criticism right now and that comes with the role and just like when I was an umpire I expect it. However to the students and PGA members that follow me, know this, I am not bothered.â€

In Thursday’s letter, Rea was more contrite. “What makes our sport great is that we own our bogeys. We certainly own this one,†Rea wrote. “Our CEO Derek Sprague has apologized on our behalf to Erica and Rory McIlroy and to everyone with Ryder Cup Europe. I would also like to personally apologize to them and all of you for not representing our association in the best light with some of my comments in the media during the event.

“While it wasn’t my intention, some of my comments were seen in a negative light which reflects poorly on not only myself but also on the PGA of America and for that I truly apologize.â€

He ended the email, “God Bless and as always Go USA!â€

The PGA of America announced in 2013 it would bring the Ryder Cup to Bethpage Black, the public golf course on Long Island that had a reputation for its raw comments directed at players. Ted Bishop was the PGA president and Pete Bevacqua was the CEO at the time of the announcement.

Bishop was forced out as president in 2014 with a month left on his two-year term for a social media post when he angrily referred to Ian Poulter as a “lil girl.â€

At all your better competitions for cups — the Solheim Cup, the Walker Cup, the Presidents Cup, the Ryder Cup — there are sessions devoted to alternate-shot play. What the Scots call foursomes. The Ryder Cup, in its formal accounting, still uses that word. All square and dormie, as golfing terms, have fallen out of favor.

But foursomes survives and sometimes thrives. It’s a wee nod to a deep truth about the game: All that’s great about it has Scottish roots.
 


Have you ever played foursomes? If you haven’t, I recommend it. It’s not a good workout for your driver, or even your putter. But it will test your ability to step up and in when the moment demands it of you. In that, it resembles life. It will get you connected to your playing partner in a way few others in sports can. And in that, too, it resembles life. It’s a regular game in very few places, most of them are in Scotland. At Prestwick, for instance, where the Open Championship got its start. 
 


At Bethpage Black, and on every other occasion when the Europeans have won a Ryder Cup, it’s because Europe has been dominant in the foursomes sessions. That is, the format by which each player takes turns. The format by which you are rooting for your playing partner when he or she plays with every fiber of your being, matched only by your desire to lift up the other player when it’s your turn. It eliminates all of golf’s inherent self-absorption.
 


At Bethpage, the Europeans won the Friday and Saturday foursomes sessions by the same margin, 3-1. Six points, on their way to the 14 they needed. There have been similar results through the years. The European players are better at foursomes than the American players. There’s a reason for that. They come out of cultures that are more communal. In Europe, they love public transportation. We are a nation of cowboys. Not judging a thing here, just trying to make an observation.
 


The Europeans wore brown shirts on Saturday, and nobody complained. My colleague Claire Rogers was making this point the other day: The European players are much more comfortable being physical with one another — hugging, draping an arm over a shoulder — than their American equivalents. 
 


Agatha McNaughton, wiserools, why they’re the proper rools of affection — and all the waitin’ and oohin’ and ahineternity at a well-soaked meal somewhere in Scotland:

“All those gentlemanly rools, why they’re the proper rools of affection — and all the waitin’ and oohin’ and ahin’ o’er yer shots, all the talk o’ this one’s drive and that one’s putt and the other one’s gorgeous swing — what is it all but love?”

Yep. Foursomes golf most particularly. I’m not saying the Americans don’t understand what Mrs. McNaughton is saying there. I am saying that for the Europeans, her words are a way of life.

The end of the Ryder Cup on Sunday hasn’t quieted any talk between the sides.

On Wednesday, European star Matt Fitzpatrick fired back at PGA of America president Don Rea, calling his comparison of the crowds at Bethpage Black and Marco Simone Golf & Country Club, which hosted the 2023 event outside Rome, “pretty offensive to European fans.”

Rea was asked Sunday by the BBC about the abuse fans on Long Island had been giving to Rory McIlroy, the Irish star who was the target of taunts and harassment throughout the Ryder Cup, leading to increased security around him during play.

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“It happened when we were in Rome on the other side and Rory understands … things like that are going to happen and I don’t know what was said. But all I know is golf is the engine of good,” Rea said.

Fitzpatrick called that comparison between fans at the sites — similar to one U.S. captain Keegan Bradley made this past weekend — off base.

“What the PGA of America guy said about it being the same in Rome — he clearly wasn’t there,” Fitzpatrick told reporters Wednesday ahead of play at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland. “Either he wasn’t there or he was listening to something else, because it was never like that. It’s always been playful, just banter.

“The interview with the PGA guy saying it was the same in Rome. That’s pretty offensive to European fans.”

Fitzpatrick also said he felt Rea was insincere during Sunday’s Ryder Cup trophy presentation after Europe held off a furious U.S. rally to secure a 15-13 win.

“I don’t want to speak for everyone, but we felt a bit of bitterness during the trophy presentation and handshake,” he said.

“Me and Rosie [Justin Rose] looked at each other thinking the congratulations didn’t feel very heartfelt. He said we only retained it, but actually we won it.”

If there’s a single moment that epitomized the R-rated heckling from U.S. fans at the Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black last week, it came early Saturday morning by the first tee, where comedian and podcaster Heather McMahan was playing the role of host and party-starter. Among her duties were engaging with fans in the hulking grandstand behind the 1st tee and 18th green, leading cheers — or trying to — and, as she put it, generally “getting everybody hyped.”

In the lead-up to the first foursomes match that morning, McMahan’s cheerleading included encouragement for Bryson DeChambeau, who was readying to take the tee with his partner, Scottie Scheffler, in their match against Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood.

“DEE-SHAM-BOW!” McMahan began hollering through her mic. “DEE-SHAM-BOW!”

The crowd joined in: “DEE-SHAM-BOW! DEE-SHAM-BOW!”

After several refrains, a cluster of fans drowned out the DeChambeau chant with one of their own: “F— YOU, RORY! F— YOU, RORY!”

McMahan hadn’t started the taunting, but she did participate, barking once into her mic: “F— YOU, RORY!”

As video of the moment began making the rounds on social media, it was a tough look both for McMahan and the event’s organizers, the PGA of America, which had little choice but to relieve McMahan of her duties. On Saturday night, the association issued a 26-word statement: “Heather McMahan has extended an apology to Rory Mcllroy and Ryder Cup Europe and has stepped down from hosting the first tee of the Ryder Cup.”

McMahan herself made no public comments about the incident. That changed Wednesday afternoon when, on the latest episode of her “Absolutely Not” podcast, she detailed her account of what went down.

McMahon said the first-tee energy on Friday — the first day of the matches — was relatively tame as she and her team were still calibrating the mics and generally feeling out how best to work the crowds.

“And then Saturday came,” she said. “The word I got from the team was we need to get everybody hyped. Team America is coming out. We need to be so out of control, so full throttle in cheers and chants and get everybody to truly pump up the team and get the energy going.”

As fans started filing in just after 5 a.m., McMahon said she started doing “crowd work” — “Where are you from? Massachusetts? OK, you’re from North Carolina. Like, doing that whole thing,” she said. “We got to get the energy up.”

As a stand-up comic, McMahan has experience entertaining big crowds; she has starred in comedy specials on Netflix and Hulu and also had a role in in the 2021 romantic comedy “Love Hard.” But she said her Ryder Cup hosting job laregly didn’t call for those skill sets, which caught her off guard.

“It was frustrating because I thought that the job that I was hired to do was not really what it ended up being in the sense of we were all trying to figure it out together as a team,” she said. “I thought I was definitely gonna be doing more celebrity interviews as the celeb showed up for first tee. I thought at one point I thought it was gonna be on broadcast. That did not happen. And then I was like, OK, so I’m just kind of like a glorified cheerleader.”

Ryder Cup emcee apologizes for heckling Rory McIlroy, won’t return Sunday

By:

Alan Bastable

McMahon tried to lead a couple of chants with U.S. players’ names, but those efforts, she said, did not go well. ”We’re just getting booed,” she said. “These guys don’t want anything to do with that. … The crowd started to get really fratty, really intense really quick. And I don’t wanna speak for everybody in the crowd. There were so many wonderful people there that were being lovely. But unfortunately, the energy and the way that the crowd moved was just, uh, it was not the vibe.”

And then came her DeChambeau cheer, which devolved into the off-color McIlroy chant, which led to McMahon’s gaffe.

“I made the absolute horrible mistake of saying it back to them once,” she said. “If you watch the video, I’m kind of like laughing to myself. Also, like question mark, like ‘F— you, Rory?’”

She added: “I will take full responsibility and sincerely apologize to Rory Team Europe for saying that. It was so foolish of me. I did not start the chant. I was just like that narrative to get out there.”

After the McIlroy chant, McMahon said she felt a shift in energy from the fans, from “fun and funny” to “kind of toxic,” and that she felt overwhelmed by having to control “4,000 dudes at 5 o’clock in the morning, shouting crazy s—.” She said at that point she told her producer and husband, Jeff Daniels, that it would be best if she stepped back from the proceedings and let the DJ take over. She also said a DP World Tour representative tour approached her and said that leading negative chants against the European players was unacceptable, a sentiment with which she agreed.

She said soon after her misstep, she contacted the DP World Tour to apologize both to McIlroy and the European team. She thought that resolved the incident until she woke up Sunday morning to find a torrent of media coverage of a certain Ryder Cup emcee — some of which, she said, inaccurately described her as having started the chant. “It really got blown out of proportion,” she said. “I just want to clear the air that it would never be my intention to be malicious to be gross to even put that kind of energy out there.”

She added: “You’re telling me that I had so much power over a group of men at a sporting event at 5 o’clock in the morning, when I shut down the chant, as soon as the words came out of my mouth, and I was like, What are we doing here, and laugh? You’re telling me that I have that much power that I then told them to go out for the rest of the day continue to drink till they absolutely were in a stupor and say horrible things to professional athletes. What? That’s where I had to draw the line and be like, hey, that makes no sense to me.”

On Sunday, McMahon said she and her husband were transported to the airport in an official Ryder Cup courtesy vehicle brandished with Ryder Cup logos, the irony of which was not lost on her comic sensibilities.

“Jeff and I had to laugh about that,” McMahon said. “We were like, this is crazy. I mean, listen, I’ve had a lesson in media. I have learned a lesson in communications. I have learned a lesson in moving forward jobs of just being like I need specific parameters. I need to know exactly what is asked of me.”

I spent the week at Bethpage Black covering this year’s Ryder Cup. It was, at different moments, inspiring, ugly, deafening, silent, raucous, joyous, tense and absolutely thrilling.

After a day to reflect (and a full night’s sleep!) I flipped back through my notebook. Here are 10 scenes I’ll take with me.

1. “There’s only oneeeee Shane Lowry”

The songs still stuck in my head tell the story.

Europe will own the soundtrack of the Ryder Cup for the foreseeable future; it’s hard to imagine that advantage flipping unless American golf fans start spending a lot more time in European soccer (or football, choose your own adventure) stadiums. It doesn’t matter that the Ryder Cup only comes along every two years; Team Europe’s fans can launch into song and get full buy-in from the surrounding crowd before they reach the second line. And don’t take my word for it. Just ask Justin Thomas:

“Yeah, the chants — I don’t know how the Europeans do it. It’s really impressive, to be honest. I don’t know if there’s like a group text of 10,000 people that they just come up with these things, but they’re pretty awesome and impressive,” he said early in the week. He added this detail:

“Our daughter’s name is Molly, and the amount of times I had that Tommy Fleetwood chant stuck in my head and both Jill and I have caught ourselves singing ‘Mol-ly,’ right along to the ‘Tom-my’ song…”

The Tom-my Fleet-wood chant

That’s a good place to start, with the anthem of the Cup’s highest points-getter, Tommy Fleetwood, whose catchy chant just goes:

Tom-my.
Tom-my, Tom-my.
Tom-my, Tom-my.
Tom-my, Tom-my FLEET-WOOD.

And then it goes again. And again. Fans deployed the same chant early and often for the similarly syllabic Ro-ry Mc-Il-roy, though you have to elide his surname a bit.

Rory McIlroy — he’s in your head

Speaking of McIlroy, this was the loudest song (and most layered in meaning — he was in everybody’s head). To the tune of the Cranberries’ “Zombie”:

He’s in your heeaaaad
In your heeeeead
Ro-o-ry, Ro-o-ry, Ro-o-ry, ry, ry

Shane Lowry’s song

And then there was the emotional heartbeat of the team — and the man who retained the Cup:

There’s only oneeeee Shane Lowry!
Oneeeee Shane Lowry!

Europe’s on fire…

Finally there was this now-classic, which echoed around Marco Simone in 2023, to the tune of Gala’s ‘Freed From Desire’:

Europe’s on fire
USA is terrified
Europe’s on fire
USA is terrified
Europe’s on fire
USA is terrified
Europe’s on fire
Hoo!
Na na na na na na na na na na na na…

The song absolutely rips. It has an interesting history; it’s from the 90s but has seen a resurgence in the last decade as an anthem across European football (or soccer) stadiums (and elsewhere) for years, so it’s hardly a Ryder Cup exclusive. But when I went back to read those original lyrics, they seem particularly fitting for this European team’s mindset…

…my love has got no money
he’s got his strong beliefs
Want more and more
people just want more and more
Freedom and love
what he’s looking for…

A few more European sing-song highlights, most (all?) of ’em borrowed from other stadiums:

As the first-tee crowd got quiet:
Is this a library

As Europe built a massive lead:
Caaan we play you
Can we play you
Can we play you every week

As Europe got five points up:
Shoes offfff
If you’re five points up

As the Americans started filing out:
Is there a fire drill

The home crowd, on the other hand, had a few notable misfires, including:
-A series of cringey first-tee chants
-An overreliance on “U-S-A,” which inevitably peters out if there’s nothing really happening
-Their emcee getting booted after chiming in on a round of “f–k you Rory”
-On Friday and Saturday mornings, AFTER the cringey first-tee chants, the first-tee music was cut off for long stretches beginning at 7 a.m. ET to avoid interrupting NBC’s ‘Breakfast at Bethpage’ show, hosted by Colin Jost, which was airing live off the right side of the tee. This was a bit of a vibe-killer.

Worth noting: The best first-tee vibes for the home team actually came on Sunday, despite the U.S. team down seven points. The sun was out, the stands were full, the music was blasting. The peak came when Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy came out to the Killers’ Mr. Brightside, which seemed to hit a real sweet spot for the crowd.

2. The enraged, caged fans

By now you’ve read and probably watched videos of the Saturday afternoon atmosphere on course, particularly around Rory McIlroy’s group, so you hardly need my confirmation. But here it is anyway: yeah, it was nasty. There are two lines you shouldn’t cross as a golf fan — don’t get personal when someone’s family is literally right there and don’t interfere with someone’s actual golf shot — and fans raced across both. I joined the McIlroy/Lowry vs. Thomas/Young group near the end of the front nine and when I arrived, everyone who’d been walking with them — families, vice captains, support staff, media members — looked a bit shell-shocked by just how toxic the atmosphere had gotten. Things got marginally better once security presence increased, but it was still a different tenor than anything I’ve heard in the better part of a decade in this job.

Why was it so bad? I think it’s fair to start with [gestures at the comment section of any post on any form of social media] the general temperature of our cultural discourse and the way we’ve gotten use to talking to each other. But it’s also worth unpacking the mechanics of why this match and this session, specifically. I was a hole ahead of this group at one point and started to understand things a bit more clearly.

The home team was getting drubbed, so fans didn’t have much to cheer for. There were tens of thousands of fans on course and only four matches, which meant people weren’t able to see much and they were on edge. A segment of those fans had been drinking all day. And McIlroy’s group came through first, which meant that every hole he and Lowry arrived at, they encountered fans frothing at the mouth; they’d been waiting for two hours for this moment and got ready to unleash the nastiest invectives they could think of. McIlroy is the most famous of the Euros and has lived his life in the public eye; he also likes to give it back to the fans as he is, in his words, “quite an impulsive character.” As a result he can end up as both lightning rod and blast shield.

Rory McIlroy on crowd behaviour at the Ryder Cup:

“Look, I don’t think we should ever accept that in golf. I think golf should be held to a higher standard than what was seen out there this week. Golf has the ability to you unite people. Golf teaches you very good life lessons.… pic.twitter.com/in1S2HOulx

— Flushing It (@flushingitgolf) September 29, 2025

Sunday was a far happier scene because none of the above was true. Fans didn’t start drinking early in the morning given the first tee time was at noon, both sides had something cheer for, there were 11 matches on the course instead of just four, Rory McIlroy was third out instead of first, etc. etc. There was still plenty of hostility. But I’m sure there are lessons to take from the mechanics of the matches that could limit the level of toxicity going forward.

3. The thrown beer

I was standing directly behind the 17th green on Saturday some 20 minutes after that McIlroy / Lowry match finished when Rory and his wife Erica came racing back down the hill to cheer on the Euros in the remaining matches — and to celebrate with the European fans. One particular group of supporters was in full celebration mode, embracing the fact that, with a day still to go, the Cup was essentially already theirs. (Or so it seemed at the time.) McIlroy dished out a few high-fives to a group of revelers who’d been dancing and singing and then, as he turned away, something happened: a drink came flying from the crowd, ricocheting off the front of Erica’s hat.

It was clearly a jarring moment for Erica and for Rory and for the entire Euro support staff, and with good reason — as bad as these personal insults were, “we’re throwing beers” marks an acceleration to an entirely different level of hostility. To their credit, nobody escalated the scene and they moved on, no doubt disturbed. But here’s the thing, and I’m cautious to even bring it up because I don’t want to be dismissive of the rest of scene: It’s actually still a little tough to tell how intentional this was. I was standing with my coworker James Colgan and we rewatched the video, zoomed, slowed down, over and over. The drink hadn’t technically been thrown; it had been slapped out of somebody’s hand from the middle of that Euro contingent. That leaves us with two possibilities:

a. The beer was hit intentionally in the McIlroys’ direction. This seemed pretty likely in real time and still seems pretty likely given the way it flew directly at them; it would be a strange coincidence for an accidental hit.

b. The beer was launched either by accident or just with excitement but wasn’t intended to fly towards either Erica or Rory.

Which was it? I genuinely have no idea. I don’t want to downplay the fact that somebody appeared to have tossed a beer at a player and/or his wife. I also think it’s possible it was an unfortunate accident. Does it matter? Yes and no. There was so much other nastiness happening around them that it’s not like this was a make-or-break incident. Still, it’s nice to stick to the truth, where we can. And the truth is that, in this case, I’m not quite sure — even standing right there.

4. Europe’s response

First there was Europe’s on-course response; their play showed that poking the bear isn’t always the right move. McIlroy and Lowry responded by ham-and-egging their way to a fist-pumping, fiery victory, and behind them Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose took it to the high-wattage American duo of Scottie Scheffler and Bryson DeChambeau in a match that included a near dust-up between players and caddies and about a thousand feet of European made putts. They finished the session 3-1 to open up a seven-point lead on the way to singles.

Then there was the off-course response. McIlroy was measured (for once) in his comments post-round when asked if things had gone too far outside the ropes.

“It’s not for me to say. People can be their own judge of whether they took it too far or not,” he said. “I’m just proud of us for being able to win today with what we had to go through.”

Lowry said he’d embraced it all.

“Yeah, it was intense. It was like something I’ve never experienced. But this is what I live for,” he said. “This is it. This is, like, honestly, the reason I get up in the morning, for stuff like this. This is what I love doing. I love being a part of this team.”

Rose, too, wanted the focus on the match and the quality of the golf. “Yeah, I’m really disappointed that this has to be the talking point at the end of a really cool match. The level of golf was incredible,” he said.

“Very happy with how strong our team is, the firepower they have, the intensity. It kind of the anti-fragile mentality,” Donald added. “Things got tougher out there, and it fired them up even more. They were able to get better through those difficult moments out there. That is what makes me most proud as a captain, just their ability to take the punches and come back even stronger.”

It was the perfect response. They didn’t cry foul — even though they would have been justified in doing so. Instead they focused on themselves and the pride they had in each other.

In the words of the slightly less subtle Curt Schilling: “I’m not sure I can think of any scenario more enjoyable than making 55,000 people from New York shut up”.

5. Scottie’s pick-me-up

It was unfathomable to see World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who’s been winning at an historic clip, start the Ryder Cup 0-4. On Sunday, after he’d picked up a point against Rory McIlroy, he admitted just how tough it had been on him, too. But it was telling to hear how much he’d leaned on his teammates Saturday night to move past it.

“This week did not go how I anticipated it going for myself, and I’m a little bit bummed, but these guys on this team, they picked me up when I needed it last night, and we’ve got a great team,” he said, choking up after logging his first point on Sunday night.

Scheffler expanded on that answer in the team’s press conference.

“I can’t tell you how much I needed these guys this week, and it’s just a really special group,” he said. “It was probably one of the lowest moments of my career, but it turned out to be one of the most special just because I’ve got great friends in this room and I was really proud to be battling with these guys for three days.”

6. Xander’s pump-up speech

Enough American players referenced this in their post-round interviews that it must have left an impression. On Saturday night, down an historic margin, Keegan Bradley delivered a pump-up speech — and Xander Schauffele added a clear message: Play to the whistle.

From DeChambeau: “I just thought back to what Xander said: ‘It’s not over till the whistle blows.’ And I wasn’t willing to give up for this team.

From Cameron Young, after his win: We said we’d play to the whistle, and it looks like the guys are doing that now.

From Justin Thomas:

7. Bryson’s run

As the U.S. began its impossible charge on Sunday afternoon, Young made an inspired birdie putt at 18 to win 1 up, and Thomas made another to also win 1 up, and DeChambeau made a clutch par putt to complete a 5-down comeback. And then, as the rest of the U.S. contingent hopped into golf carts to rejoin the action some holes back, DeChambeau waved off a cart driver and took a full-adrenaline sprint down the length of the par-4 18th. It felt like a release of sorts, a moment of relief after days of tension and disappointment. Now the comeback was on, there was hope in his heart and there was the satisfaction of knowing he’d done what he could to help.

The good news is his run was mostly downhill. But 400-plus yards is a long way to go at full speed, so when DeChambeau hit the uphill back by the 18th tee box, he finally accepted the help from a passing cart.

8. Viktor’s neck

I’ve seen various viral posts basically implying that Viktor Hovland was faking the injury that kept him out of Sunday singles, some of them joking but some presumably not. Whatever you may think of the Envelope Rule (which at this point probably is antiquated, and also seems particularly silly in this exact situation, when one side needs a massive comeback and every half-point is precious), there’s no way that Viktor Hovland would have voluntarily sat out of a singles match. After all, before he was a last-minute scratch on Saturday afternoon he’d played 13 of a possible 13 sessions in his Ryder Cup career.

Also, Hovland was out supporting Team Europe on Sunday afternoon and a couple times I saw people wish him well and he’d do the thing you do when you’ve messed up your neck where you stiffly turn your entire body just to rotate a few degrees left. Get well soon, Vik.

9. Erica’s defense

There were countless meaningful moments in the European winner’s press conference, but as always it felt like McIlroy was the main character; he fielded the most questions, his eyes tearing up more than once as he basked in the satisfaction of a sixth Ryder Cup win.

Since the 2023 Ryder Cup McIlroy has made it clear what means the most to him as he nears 20 years as a professional; that short list includes winning at meaningful venues, winning another major (preferably the Masters) winning an away Ryder Cup. This year he won at Pebble Beach and at TPC Sawgrass against big-time PGA Tour fields. He won at Augusta National, completing the career Grand Slam in the process. He added on an emotional win at his home Irish Open. And then he went 3-1-1 at Bethpage Black to win his sixth Ryder Cup.

But it was a particularly touching moment to hear him talk about his wife Erica, given she was the target of so much abuse at the hands of the fans. McIlroy plays golf at a superhuman level and he’s been a celebrity for more than half his life, but this was a particularly human moment as he spoke about Erica and his teammates chimed in behind him.

McIlroy: “It should be off-limits, but obviously it wasn’t this week. Erica is fine. She’s a very, very strong woman. You know, she handled everything this week with class and poise and dignity like she always has. I love her — and we’re going to have a good time celebrating tonight.

Justin Rose: “Can I just pick up on that, if you don’t mind, because I actually had no idea that Erica had a beer thrown at her yesterday, so fair play to Erica. She didn’t bring that to the team room. We didn’t make that a big deal. That’s news to me. That says a lot about the strength of Erica and everybody on this team.”

Shane Lowry: “I was out there for two days with Erica McIlroy, and the amount of abuse that she received was astonishing and the way she was out there supporting her husband and supporting her team was unbelievable, and kudos to her for that.”

10. Luke’s shampoo

I’ll start this final point by acknowledging that every point won in this and every Ryder Cup was won by superior golf shots and by fewer strokes taken. There’s no crowd chant that can teach you to stuff an iron shot to five feet under unfathomable pressure. Also, the U.S. absolutely dominated the singles session and nearly pulled off the most improbable comeback in the event’s history.

WITH THAT SAID, it’s hard to look at the decades of European success in this event, particularly the team portions, and wave it away as randomness or nonsense. They’re better at the little stuff. And they’re bought in on the idea that the little stuff is the big stuff. Y’know who believes that? Luke Donald, who Bradley (among others) called the greatest captain the European side has ever seen. Does this somehow mean they make more putts? It’s hard to say for sure but, as silly as it sounds, you certainly can’t dismiss the idea.

“My job is literally to give these guys a better chance to win. It can be as simple as some very small things,” Donald said. Those small things?

“I’ll give you an example. At the hotel rooms this week, the doors to our hotel rooms had a big crack that let in light. We brought things that covered the light. We put different shampoos that had a better smell. We changed the bedding because the beds weren’t very good, and they just had sheets, and we created much nicer beds so guys could sleep. They could have more energy. Those are just little things.”

One final bit of Donald philosophy:

“That’s a big part of my captaincy is to create an environment where these guys are having the best weeks of their lives, honestly. We’ll always remember this.”

Based on the bus rides, I think he’s right…

Dylan Dethier welcomes your comments at dylan_dethier@golf.com.

every time I see a video of this Euro team on their bus it looks like the most fun you could ever have. also ‘freed from desire’ absolutely ripspic.twitter.com/yoGc6KojvX

— Dylan Dethier (@dylan_dethier) September 30, 2025

Rory McIlroy was a key character at Bethpage Black last week, not only because he’s Europe’s best player and a recent Grand Slam winner, but because he was also the primary target of American fans’ relentless heckling.

McIlroy and his wife, Erica, received constant — sometimes vulgar — badgering from U.S. fans at the Ryder Cup, and McIlroy’s matches required extra uniformed security. A few times he had to step off shots, and in a handful of cases he snapped back at the hecklers.

At times, it was an ugly scene.

Late Sunday night, after Europe held off the Americans’ Sunday charge and won the Ryder Cup, McIlroy was asked if that kind of fan behavior was taking the game in a dangerous direction.

“I think golf should be held to a higher standard than what was seen out there this week,” he said. “Golf has the ability to you unite people. Golf teaches you very good life lessons. It teaches you etiquette. It teaches you how to play by the rules. It teaches you how to respect people. … It was a rough week for all of us. But at the same time, we shut them up by our performance and how we played. I chirped back a few times because it got to me a few times, but we tried to handle everything that came our way with class and poise, and for the most part, I felt like we did that.”

One former U.S. Ryder Cup captain, however, wasn’t a fan of McIlroy’s response.

Speaking on GOLF’s Subpar podcast at the conclusion of the Ryder Cup Sunday, Paul Azinger, who led the U.S. team to a Ryder Cup win at Valhalla in 2008, said McIlroy can’t have it both ways.

Azinger started by complimenting McIlroy for his role in rallying his team. He said when McIlroy said two years that winning a road Ryder Cup is one of the hardest things to do in golf, that essentially took pressure off his fellow players, which allowed them to arrive at Bethpage relaxed and with nothing to lose.

Rory McIlroy’s wife battled ‘astonishing’ fan abuse, European players said

By:

Sean Zak

“I give Rory credit for that,” Azinger said, “but now I want to take a shot at Rory, who I love.”

Azinger said McIlroy “probably turned down $500 million” to join LIV Golf and has been a staunch PGA Tour loyalist, but he didn’t appreciate his thoughts on decorum given some of his own actions.

“In the press conference after it’s over, he is saying that I think golf should be held to a higher standard of decorum, but in the meantime he says ‘F you, F you, F you’ in full voice for the world to see,” said Azinger, referring to one particular McIlroy celebration on one of the greens. “He turns around and says to the guy, ‘Shut the F up.’ The guy in the media asks him, How did that feel Rory, to tell him to shut up and then hit it to two feet?And he said, ‘It felt pretty f’ing good.’

“And I’m like, which is it, Rory? Is it that golf is held to a higher standard or are you just going to F you the fans and act that like that’s OK? So I love Rory, but you can’t say that. You can’t say the fans need to behave better and then in the meantime lay them to waste. You can’t do both. You’ve got to be one or the other.”

In the hours since the Ryder Cup concluded, much has been said and written about fan behavior and the response to it. But Azinger said no one should be surprised.

“Didn’t the PGA of America know when they came here what was going to happen?” he said. “Of course, we all knew. We’ve all been talking about it for 10 years, that this crowd could go crazy. Hey if the beers weren’t $16 a piece, it could have been worse.”

The Americans were blown out the first two days, as Europe grabbed a commanding 11.5-4.5 lead and — after the teams split a half point due to Viktor Hovland’s WD — needed just two points Sunday to retain the Cup. But the Americans fought back in Sunday singles and lost just 15-13. Europe was the first time to win on the road in more than a decade.

“I don’t know what happened in Europe’s team room but they almost let it get away,” Azinger said. “But they did the slaughtering the first two days. That was a tough pill to swallow. There was a time when I thought it was just going to be the most devastating defeat and the PGA of America was going to have to restructure everything. And it turned out not to be that way at all. It was actually a bit of a nail-biter.”

You catch watch the entire Azinger appearance below.

The atmosphere at this week’s Alfred Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland will be quite different from the one the European Ryder Cuppers just conquered at Bethpage Black.

Four members of Team Europe — Tyrrell Hatton, Tommy Fleetwood, Matt Fitzpatrick and Robert MacIntyre — will tee it up on the DP World Tour this week, but the golf world doesn’t seem ready to turn the page just yet. Especially when it comes to their historic victory and the New York crowd that relentlessly hurled insults at European players and families for three days.

Rory McIlroy, who got the worst of it, called the behavior “unacceptable.” Shane Lowry said that the verbal abuse McIlroy’s wife, Erica, dealt with was “astonishing.” On Saturday, American captain Keegan Bradley said some fans crossed the line, but he also didn’t see the environment as being that different from the one the Americans faced in Rome in 2023.

“I thought the fans were passionate,” Bradley said of the fans on Saturday. “I mean, their home team is getting beat bad. They are passionate fans. I wasn’t at Rome but I heard a lot of stories that Rome was pretty violent as well.”

In an interview with the BBC on Sunday of the Ryder Cup, PGA of America president Don Rea also suggested the crowd abuse was similar to what happened at Marco Simone.

There’s a lot you can say about the fans at Bethpage — but I think it’s worth starting at the source.

When the leader of your org says he hasn’t heard much verbal abuse of Rory McIlroy, perhaps there wasn’t much care about it happening pic.twitter.com/qPYGl7Pcr7

— Sean Zak (@Sean_Zak) September 30, 2025

“I haven’t heard some of that — I’m sure it’s happened,” Rea said when asked about the torrent of verbal abuse hurled at McIlroy on Saturday. “It happened when we were in Rome on the other side and Rory understands … things like that are going to happen and I don’t know what was said. But all I know is golf is the engine of good.”

Hatton, who was also a member of the winning European Ryder Cup team in Rome, pushed back on the assertion that both sides have the same problem.

“Personally, I don’t think they were close at all,” Hatton said on Wednesday in Scotland. “I certainly, with what I heard last week, I don’t think Rome comes anywhere near that. … I don’t know what else to add to that. I think they are quite far apart to be honest.”

Fitzpatrick, whose parents didn’t travel to the Ryder Cup due to the expected crowd abuse, didn’t appreciate the whataboutism being thrown around by the U.S. decision-makers.

“I saw the interview with the PGA guy discussing how it was the same in Rome,” Fitzpatrick said. “It’s pretty offensive to European fans that he said that, really.”

Fleetwood, who went 4-1-0 in the Ryder Cup, didn’t want to paint all American golf fans with a broad brush. Bad actors at Bethpage crossed the line between supporting the home team and attacking the European players and their families, but it wasn’t representative of everyone who came out to see the biennial event.

“There’s a big difference between a hostile environment and personal comments,” Fleetwood said. “Again, I think we were all prepared for it. Of all the talk that there’s been, it’s not about the entire U.S. fans or the crowd. Like I don’t think that we should be sort of using that as a whole. I have so many friends that are Americans and that were at the Ryder Cup, people close to me, saying, I’ve got to support my own team, things like that. That’s just what it is. You’re going to get a tough environment when you get to an away Ryder Cup. Yeah, personal comments can go too far, and you obviously hope that that doesn’t happen again, or it shouldn’t happen. But it’s just so out of our control, and I think Keegan and — you just have to understand what you’re getting into and what you’re there for and go play golf.

“Like I say, how many people were there — 50,000 people, 60,000 people? You can’t have a go at everyone because the majority don’t do that. I have no hard feelings about it at all.”

At Ryder Cup marred by ugliness, U.S. showed class in defeat

By:

Michael Bamberger

Derek Sprague, the CEO of the PGA of America, condemned the behavior in an interview with Golf Channel and said he planned to apologize to all of Team Europe.

“And I can’t wait to reach out to Rory and Erica and really, quite frankly, the entire European team,” Sprague told Golf Channel’s Rex Hoggard. “He might have been a target because of how good he is, but the whole European team should not have been subjected to that. And because of that, I feel badly and I plan on apologizing to them.”

As for the jeering he faced in New York, Hatton knows he didn’t get the worst of it. However, he hopes that when the Ryder Cup goes to Adare Manor in 2027, the crowd will choose to celebrate their team’s achievements instead of abusing the opponent.

“To be honest, I think some guys on the team had a lot worse than others,” Hatton said. “For me personally, yeah, there was a lot of insults maybe around height or hair line or weight, which — some of which I pretty much said to myself anyway, so it wasn’t like anything new.

“If it was my choice, and obviously what I say isn’t really going to affect how people behave, but I don’t really think that the insults is the way forward,” Hatton said when asked about the expected atmosphere in 2027. “I would much prefer it to be a respectful atmosphere; you let the guys play and the best team wins, rather than trying to affect the outcome by trying to putt off players or things like that.”

As for this week at the Dunhill, the Ryder Cup champions will welcome the change of pace after a week at Bethpage.

“The atmosphere will be worlds apart,” Hatton said. “Last week was pretty intense. This week will feel somewhat quieter but in some ways, also looking forward to that.”

On Sunday afternoon, as the Ryder Cup singles matches were kicking off, I was posted up on the bridge walkway behind the driving range watching Rory McIlroy warm up and gossiping with media pals about how it had come to this: Europe leading 12 to 5.

All manner of topics were bandied about as we looked for answers to explain it, when I looked to my right and saw one of them. Dodo Molinari, vice captain for Europe, one of the leading statisticians in pro golf. But it wasn’t just seeing Dodo; it was more that Dodo was chatting with Mark Broadie, the founder of Strokes Gained, and the two brothers — Will and Matt Courchene — who founded DataGolf, the leading pro golf analytics source.

While I couldn’t know specifically what they were talking about, the convo between these four people on the back of a driving range was all but guaranteed to be about the quantification of the Ryder Cup. You know, like those compatibility scores DataGolf released for foursomes and fourball partners (which went as viral as golfer compatibility scores can). Or how Molinari split up the successful pairing for Ludvig Aberg and Viktor Hovland from Rome.

Anyone who enjoys the matrices of analytics that define this sport would have paid good money to be their fifth wheel, but now that the Cup has come and gone, it’s important to remember one thing. Even that quartet of calculus-minded golf guys would tell you, humans aren’t numbers.

Those three words circled my head from the first session on Friday. DataGolf had measured each skill of each player in the lead-up to the even and projected American advantages in every element of the game. Off the tee, approaching the green, around the green and putting. But the advantage was stunningly slim. Check out the pentagon below to see how slight the red outpaced the blue.

DataGolf

When you combine the skillsets of 12 of the best golfers in the world — who all play mostly the same courses in the United States — together they’re going to chart a similar shape. One player’s ineptitude can be masked by another player’s brilliance. Rarely do statisticians include variance in the visuals on their websites but they know it exists, particularly in a match that only lasts 15 holes.

All of this is to say — the numbers are damn important. They are the crux of almost all relevant dialogue. They are the starting point around which captains should be making decisions. The minute you veer away from the numbers is the minute you incur slivers of risk that, when compounded, create whole chunks of risk.

But, for all that the numbers can tell us, they cannot guarantee that World No. 3 Russ Henley will play to a World No. 3 level. (To say nothing of Scottie Scheffler.) And if Henley does play to that level, they cannot guarantee it will be worth anything more than a halved singles match. Henley was bad on Friday morning, average on Saturday morning and brilliant on Sunday afternoon. (Regardless of that putt on 18.) He eked out 0.5 points in his debut Ryder Cup. Bob MacIntyre was not-so-good in two of his three matches, and yet all of them reached the 18th hole. He earned 1.5 points for Europe.

Numbers are great, but they don’t have families. Numbers are vital, but they don’t get fatigued. Whoop numbers could be just as important as the numbers on your scorecard.

Numbers would never worry about crowd control because numbers don’t get nervous! Numbers don’t even think about experience. But there goes Justin Rose “doing some interesting things,” as Cameron Young put it Sunday night. Rose had lost his putting groove in the middle of the summer and gained it back a bit in August. And you know what? Numbers tend to include everything you’ve done recently, in the name of a greater sample size, so they wouldn’t have thought Rosie would get en fuego with the flatstick.

Only, this is exactly what the numbers told us two years ago, when Rose led the field in Strokes Gained: Putting at the Rome Ryder Cup. He nearly did it again this week, finishing second only to Sepp Straka, who entered the week having had zero competitive rounds in more than a month. Go figure! The R in Ryder Cup is for Randomness.

If you’re still confused by what happened at Bethpage, just know you’re not alone. I am, too, and so is Keegan Bradley. Two years is just long enough to forget that the numbers behind everything are created by humans. And the numbers we’ll be poring over ahead of Adare Manor? They’ll be created by individuals we’ll want to manipulate into teams.

One of the most contentious and unsavory Ryder Cups has given way to predictable handwringing over fan behavior last week at Bethpage Black, where members of Team Europe endured days of relentless ridicule and vocal abuse.

PGA of America CEO Derek Sprague agreed to an interview Tuesday with GolfChannel.com to address fan behavior and the future of Bethpage as a major championship venue (transcript below, edited slightly for clarity; video above):

Golf Channel: I spoke with a PGA member this morning who told me he was disgusted with some fan behavior at Bethpage, what do you tell your membership about what happened?

Derek Sprague: Certainly, it’s not the values of the PGA of America or our 30,000 PGA golf professionals who work every day in this game to bring joy and laughter and fun to golf. Certainly, we did not witness that, there’s no place for that [poor fan behavior] at the Ryder Cup, no place for it in the game of golf and we are not happy with what happened last week.

GC: What was the plan for crowd control and how did it evolve?

DS: We’ve been planning for a number of years going into this event, like we do for all our major championships. Planning with law enforcement and other security agencies and we certainly did this at Bethpage. We knew the Ryder Cup is the biggest event in golf and transcends many sports. We worked closely with the New York State Police, they were the lead agency and then we had several layers of security including private security companies to deal with the amount of fans which is typical of a Ryder Cup. It’s not like we had any large increase in [fan] numbers.

We worked with them on the plan and like any live sporting event we made sure we adjusted as the days went on and we reacted to fan behavior, including removing a number of fans from the event or moving them away from players they were abusing. We dealt with it swiftly and efficiently as it was made known to us. It’s a big golf course out there and we had plenty of law enforcement with the players, both sides of the fairways and when you’re looking at a large crowd it can be challenging to identify. But when they were identified they were dealt with very quickly.

GC: Specifically, when was the call made Saturday to increase security with Rory McIlroy’s group?

DS: As the CEO I let our team deal with that in the moment, let them do their job. I have an incredible amount of trust and confidence with our security consultant team. They were working very closely with our [operations] team and the New York State Police and all the other agencies.

That’s an example of how we reacted, when we heard those things going on Saturday we immediately redirected more of the security forces to those matches, whether it was Rory’s match or other matches or fan behavior in certain parts of the golf course. On Sunday we made sure to keep that amount of security in place, made sure it was what we felt, and our security consultants felt, was the right amount of people to make sure that, one, the players were safe and the fans would be dealt with swiftly if they got out of line.

GC: Bethpage will host the 2033 PGA Championship, based on what happened last week is there any thought of moving that championship?

DS: There’s no thought of that. Bethpage Black is just a great championship layout. We will take all our debriefs from this week, everything from logistics – we were not perfect on logistics, either – and we will be looking at that as well for the next two championships over the next eight years as well as making sure that we have the right plans in place.

That’s one thing that I think we do well, we learn from this event like we learn from all of our events. We try to make the next PGA Championship or the next Ryder Cup the best it’s ever been. That’s what we intend to do here and carry what we learned from this past week into those championships going forward.

GC: Does the PGA take any responsibility for the pre-event messaging that the crowds were going to be large, loud and difficult for the European team?

DS: We take responsibility for the fan behavior, but New York fans, we knew going into this that they are passionate. They love their sports teams here and that’s what makes the Ryder Cup special, that they are passionate on both sides.

I’ve been to nine Ryder Cups, I’ve been to a number of them overseas as well as here. They are passionate on both sides, and certainly we had a small number of fans that crossed the line this past week, but I don’t think it’s indicative of every fan. I’ve received e-mails and text messages, fans had great experiences this week. Whether they may not have been with those particular matches in the heat of the battle that had some people cross the line. It’s been mixed, but certainly we want to improve and we know the fans are very passionate in that market. But there are no plans to change that venue, it’s a great venue.

Sprague on Ryder Cup crowd control procedures

PGA of America CEO Derek Sprague joins Golf Central to lay out the security procedures at the Ryder Cup and the responses to heckling fans throughout the event.

GC: Why is Bethpage Black, as a venue for the PGA of America, important enough to offset that fan behavior?

DS: Having five great golf courses at Bethpage, Bethpage Black obviously standing out as a championship venue, is a great example of a private-public partnership.

It has a lot of space, a lot of space for our vendors. It has a lot of space for corporate hospitality. This week we had helicopter pads on one of the golf courses, the polo field was the staging area. That’s one thing when we select sites the golf course is just one box to check, we want to make sure it’s a championship golf course, but we also have to look outside the ropes. We need a lot of space today for TV compounds, our vendors, corporate hospitality. We have a lot of infrastructure and we just need a lot of space.

That’s why Bethpage Black lends itself so well to a major championship like the PGA Championship or the KPMG Women’s PGA (2028) or last week’s Ryder Cup.

GC: Why should fans, on both sides, be confident that there won’t be similar episodes at Hazeltine in 2029?

DS: Any championship that we run, whether it’s the Ryder Cup or any of the other majors, with our partners at Ryder Cup Europe, talking with their leadership there, there is no place for this type of behavior that crosses the line.

Our discussions leading into Adare Manor in two years, we will be talking to their leadership, like we did this year. We had meetings in advance, ‘What are we going to do about the crowds?’ We explained all the protocols we had in place with the New York State Police and they had a level of confidence that it would be dealt with and we’ll do the same thing going into 2027 in Ireland to make sure we uphold the integrity and sportsmanship of the Ryder Cup. When it started in 1927 it was about sportsmanship and integrity of the game and that’s what we want it to continue to be.

It’s unfortunate that people crossed the line last week and I hope it doesn’t take away from the brilliant play of both teams that we witnessed last week.

These were the 24 best players in the world and I think they gave golf fans around the globe just an incredible event to tune into. We saw that with the ratings when the Americans were making a run on Sunday afternoon, people were tuning in. That’s what the Ryder Cup should be remembered by, unfortunately some people had a bad experience and are going to remember it for the fan behavior or the long bus lines or the traffic jam. But let’s not take away from the great play.

GC: Not sure if you had a chance to speak with any Europeans players from last week, but if you did what was your message?

DS: I talked a little to Paul McGinley last night. I haven’t spoken to Rory or Erica [McIlroy], I do plan on sending them an e-mail with my heartfelt apologies because of what occurred. There’s no place for that in the Ryder Cup or the game of golf. I heard Rory say it, we’re better than that in golf. That’s one thing our game has always portrayed when you compare us to other sports is that golf is a great game and people enjoy the game because of the values that golf has.

I can’t wait to reach out to Rory and Erica, and really the entire European team. Rory might have been a target because of how good he is, but the entire European team should not have been subjected to that. I feel badly and I plan on apologizing to them.

GC: How do you keep this from happening again?

DS: I was the co-chair of the Ryder Cup task force back when we started it in 2014. We talked about, really, the team and the captaincies and vice captains, more on the competition side, but certainly we will be doing a debrief internally with our [operations] team and all of our incredible employees with the PGA of America. The Ryder Cup committee, I’m sure, will reflect on this. That task force was designed to determine how we can put the team in the best position to be successful.

We did that in ’14, we won in ’16, we won in ’21, so I think it showed some success. I look forward to, as the new CEO, getting back on that task force or Ryder Cup committee, and see what we can do, not only to make the competition reflect the values of the Ryder Cup but also to give the American team our best chance at success.

Tyrrell Hatton has urged European supporters not to lower themselves to the level of US golf fans when the Ryder Cup heads to Adare Manor in 2027.

Europe’s players were boorishly abused, with Rory McIlroy and his American wife, Erica, targeted for particularly vile treatment, as Bethpage turned ugly. Hatton, who secured the half in the Sunday singles that guaranteed victory for Europe, has told home fans not to seek retribution in Ireland in two years’ time.

“If it was my choice, and what I say isn’t really going to affect how people behave, I don’t really think that the insults are the way forward,†Hatton said. “Some guys on the team had it a lot worse than others. For me, there were a lot of insults maybe around height or hairline or weight, some of which I pretty much say to myself anyway, so it wasn’t like anything new.

“But I would much prefer it to be a respectful atmosphere. You let the guys play and the best team wins – rather than trying to affect the outcome by trying to put off players or things like that. I don’t think it will be as hostile as maybe it was last week. I’d like to think that it will be very respectful.â€

The US captain, Keegan Bradley, who refused to condemn the “passionate†home fans at Bethpage, claimed behaviour at the New York course was no different to that in Rome two years ago, when Europe last hosted. Hatton, who went unbeaten for a second successive Ryder Cup, disagrees.

“Personally I don’t think they were close at all,†the Englishman said. “Certainly with what I heard last week, I don’t think Rome comes anywhere near that. I think they are quite far apart.â€

The PGA of America chief executive, Derek Sprague, told the Golf Channel he intends to contact McIlroy in person to apologise for what he and his wife went through. “I do plan on sending them an email with my heartfelt apologies for what occurred,†Sprague said. “There’s no place for that in the Ryder Cup or in the game of golf.

“I can’t wait to reach out to Rory and Erica and really, quite frankly, the entire European team. The whole European team should not have been subjected to that. And because of that, I feel badly and I plan on apologising to them.

“When it [the Ryder Cup] started in 1927, it was about sportsmanship and integrity of the game, and that’s what we want it to be and continue to be and it’s unfortunate that people crossed the line last week.â€

However, Matt Fitzpatrick called out the organisation’s president, Don Rea, on Wednesday for his churlish reaction to the 15-13 home defeat at the trophy presentation. “I don’t want to speak on behalf of everyone but we did feel there was a little bit of bitterness when they presented the trophy,†Fitzpatrick said.

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“Me and Rosey [Justin Rose] both looked at each other as if to say: ‘That wasn’t a very heartfelt congratulations.’ He said we only retained it but actually we won it.â€

As Hatton and Fitzpatrick return to action on Thursday alongside Tommy Fleetwood and Bob McIntyre at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland, Luke Donald is mulling over whether to stay on for a third term as Europe’s captain. Fleetwood believes the job should be Donald’s if he wants it after back‑to‑back triumphs, but that Europe have a ready-made successor in his vice‑captain Francesco Molinari.

“The ball is probably in Luke’s court and I think he’s earned that,†Fleetwood said. “I’ve spoken to Francesco about it numerous times. I think the respect he has from his peers and the players, his accomplishments and his experience, I think goes a long way to being a Ryder Cup captain.â€