The road had been long and agonising but after three consecutive losses the Americans have regained possession of the cherished Ryder Cup trophy. Following their loss at Gleneagles two years ago, and (arguably) even more traumatic defeat by the Europeans in the “Miracle at Medinah” in 2012, the U.S. team – prompted by Phil Mickelson – set up a task force of current and former players to determine what went wrong and seek solutions to wrest control of the Cup back from the dominant Europeans.
One of the first steps was the appointment of Davis Love III as captain (also in charge against José María Olazábal four years ago) and another key move was to seek input from a wide and disperse spectrum of players and others involved in the sport.
Their conclusions led to a decision to revise the qualification and selection process (including giving Love a final captain’s pick the weekend before the matches at Hazeltine National in Minnesota), reinforce the backroom support team (which included Tiger Woods as a vice captain) and generally instil a greater spirit of camaraderie among the team members.
The result – whether or not it can be attributed to the task force’s endeavours or, at least partly anyway, to a relatively weak European team comprising six rookies (three of whom won no points) – was a resounding 17-11 victory, with the Americans taking a 4-0 lead on the first morning and finishing ahead on each of the first two days.
