Mickelson slammed his ball into the bushes. From the disgusted look on Tiger’s face he was thinking, “Who is this idiot?” The pair lost twice that day. It’s fair to say that Woods, for all his 15 major tournament victories, never really got the idea of “team”.
Fast-forward a couple of days: the winning putt for Europe was holed by Colin Montgomerie. If he’d played every major the way he played in the Ryder Cup, he’d have had as many trophies as Woods. But he’s never won any.
Woods played in eight Ryder Cups, and the USA triumphed just once. Montgomerie was never beaten in Ryder Cup singles and Europe won five times in the eight editions he played. Between them, these two great golfers represent the eternal mystery of team sport.
Golfers don’t usually have to worry about other people. Perhaps that’s why they choose the sport. Woods at the Ryder Cup reminded me of the actor who asked the director what he should do in the pauses. What pauses? “You know – when other people are speaking.”
It’s time to consider the phenomenon of team playing again as the Ryder Cup moves to Bethpage Black Course at Farmingdale, New York State. The American build-up has been dominated by one question: should the captain, Keegan Bradley, pick himself as a player? President Trump posted on social media that he should go for it, but in the end, Bradley said no. “It hurts for sure,” he said.
The captain of Europe, Luke Donald, had no such dilemma. He selected the same team that won in Rome two years ago, apart from preferring Rasmus HØjgaard to his twin brother Nicolai. The Ryder Cup is contested on alternate occasions in the USA and Donald needs experienced players who can cope with a hostile crowd.
US sport is inward-looking, with gridiron football, baseball, basketball. When international sport does come to the USA, there’s a tendency to overdo the partisanship. I can still hear the whoops from the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
Cheering on your own team is one thing, exhibiting seething hostility to the opposition is quite another. And golf is particularly vulnerable to bad vibes. The spectators are very close to the players and can speak to them directly. The action lasts all day and there’s plenty of opportunity for refuelling. As a result there can be – well, a certain overzealousness among the galleries as the beer gets vocal.
Golfers don’t usually have to worry about other people
All this intensity sometimes leads to moments of serious excess. Past tournaments are remembered as the Battle of Brookline and the War on the Shore, occasions when patriotism got out of hand. Sport matters because it doesn’t matter. In that contradiction lies the whole point and meaning of sport, but such things can be forgotten as the scoreboard turns American red. Or when it doesn’t.
President Trump has promised to show up on the first day, and he’s unlikely to be a calming influence. “I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us in trade,” he has said. Hating Europe has been legitimised. It could be an uncomfortable three days.
There are, then, a good number of complications as 12 Europeans and 12 Americans set about knocking small white balls into slightly larger holes. It’d be nice to think that we’ll still be talking about team players on Sunday night.
The documentary Una Famiglia: Team Europe’s Ryder Cup Story is on Wednesday at 11.30pm on BBC2
