Once again, the biannual Ryder Cup tournament is set to send shivers down the spines of many golf aficionados in both Europe and the United States. The 37th Ryder Cup will take place from 19th to 21st September, with top golf professionals from both continents battling it out in one of the last great sporting events founded on prestige rather than prizes.
With the European Tour golfers having won three consecutive (and five of the last six) Ryder Cups, the US PGA team wants to make sure that it takes full advantage of its home turf. This year's Ryder Cup will be hosted at the Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky, which previously hosted the Senior PGA Championship in May 2004 and the PGA Club Professional Championship in June 2002. Outside of tournaments, it generally serves as a private golf club, and was designed by professional golfer Jack Nicklaus.
US Team Captain Paul Azinger intends to give his team another slight advantage, announcing a change to alternate shot format, citing past performance of the US team when playing under this format. For the first time in nine years, the opening matches of the Ryder Cup will feature this format, which over the last three matches was replaced with what is known as Four Ball Better-Ball. Azinger has also revamped the method of team selection, using the amount of prize money earned by a golfer in order to determine the top eight golfers, and then manually picking golfers nine to twelve.
As for the European team, three time masters winner Nick Faldo is the team captain, and believes that playing on US courses may be to his advantage too. After all, Faldo won Augusta in 1989, 1990 and 1996, and even does commentary for US based ESPN and ABC television networks. The European team will be selected via two qualifying measurements, the World Ranking Points List and the European Tour List.
Regardless of who wins, the 2008 Ryder Cup is expected to be one of the highlights of the sporting year, with millions of viewers in several markets.
John Casson writes for the Imagine Golf Club website, a place where one can get information about the 2008 Ryder Cup and all future and past Ryder Cups, including a detailed look at each of the 18 holes and all the golfers involved, plus latest Ryder Cup scores during the tournament. |
