Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (France) (AFP) – After Europe matched a Ryder Cup record with eight consecutive match victories, a reeling United States was left to show resiliency Saturday to have any hope of keeping the trophy.
Europe seized an 8-4 lead in the biennial team golf showdown by going 3-1 in Saturday morning fourball matches, leaving only four afternoon foursomes affairs and Sunday’s 12 concluding singles duels to decide a winner at Le Golf National.
“We’re very enthusiastic about where we are,” US Cup rookie Tony Finau said. “We’re taking three points this afternoon. If we sweep them it’s a whole different ball game. We know there are 12 points up tomorrow. We’re getting beat, but we have a lot of golf left.”
Defending champions the United States, trying to snap a 25-year European win drought, need 14 points to retain the Cup while Europe need 14 1/2 to win for the ninth time in 12 attempts.
Unless they win the final pairs session, the Americans — boasting 11 of the world’s 17 top-ranked golfers — will be faced with chasing a record margin to capture the Cup, each team having rallied from 10-6 down on the final day in a shocker, the USA in 1999’s Battle of Brookline and Europe in the 2012 Miracle at Medinah.
“To get momentum back, getting us closer than four points by the end of the day would be the goal,” three-time major winner Jordan Spieth said. “We know if it’s four or less, it has been done before.”
Spieth has confidence in the Americans’ ability to score well in singles.
“If we can make up some ground our team can certainly pull it off in singles,” 10th-ranked Spieth said. “We’re two evenly matched teams and here on their soil with the fans they have an extra gear.”
Spieth and fourth-ranked Justin Thomas edged Ian Poulter and Jon Rahm 2 and 1 in the final fourball match to snap an eight-match win spurt by Europe that equalled the longest in Ryder Cup history, set by a 1967 American squad that included Arnold Palmer.
“We knew how big this point was and hopefully we’ll get it turned around,” Thomas said.
“We got some momentum. Now we have to keep it going,” US captain Jim Furyk said. “Whoever has the hot hand has to get some points.”
Ninth-ranked Rickie Fowler warned that winning starts with finding fairways and sinking more putts.
“You’ve got to get the ball in the fairway and at least give yourself opportunities,” he said. “Once that happens, we need to start making some more putts as a team.”
– ‘Our guys will respond’ –
With 14-time major winner Tiger Woods leading the way, the US squad boasts nine major champions with a combined 31 major titles compared to five major winners and eight major titles for Europe, four-time major champion Rory McIlroy setting the pace.
But what matters now is shotmaking over a difficult French layout half of the US team hadn’t seen until this week.
“We have to shore things up,” Furyk said. “I think our guys will respond, I really do. I have a lot of confidence in this team.”
Furyk admitted seeing European domination on the scoreboard can make matters worse for players struggling to halt a European wave.
“You start seeing those putts go in. You start seeing the birdies. You start seeing the blue numbers on the board. I think the guys press a little hard,” Furyk said.
“I think they try a little bit too hard and I think they put a little bit too much pressure on themselves.”
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