Sometimes it’s almost embarrassing to crow about a winning tip and I was closer to tears for poor Danny Willett than joy at 16/1 selection Max Homa being gifted a successful defence of the Fortinet Championship.
One ahead standing on the last tee, the 2016 Masters champion had looked a certain winner when Homa failed to find the last green, a par five, in three, while the Englishman stood just 3ft 7in from the pin in the same number. But Homa holed his chip for birdie and the startled Willett jammed his tiddler 4ft 8in past and missed the return. It was more like a scene out of Caddyshack than real life.
So not even a playoff for Willett on a anti-climactical Sunday for two Yorkshiremen with Matt Fitzpatrick, put off by a camera click on the first extra hole at the Italian Open, unable to match Bob MacIntyre’s immaculate birdie four on next year’s Ryder Cup course outside Rome.
And what an important (and overdue) victory it was for the talented young Scot whose heart had been set on gaining a place in Luke Donald’s squad. To do so at the expense of the US Open champion and Europe’s star player Rory McIlroy with Donald in attendance and at magnificent Marco Simone was mega.
Yet, as he admitted, his game “had been all over the place” for a good while, hence his odds of 50/1. Now “Bobby Mac” will be odds-on to face the fearsome Americans who themselves will be odds-on next September to repeat last year’s shellacking at Whistling Straits – although nowhere near the price they are for this week’s Presidents Cup at Quail Hollow.
This biennial contest against The Internationals – in other words the Rest of the World minus Europe – has always been a pale imitation of the Ryder Cup because why would a Canadian be busting a gut for a South Korean partner who can’t even understand him or a South African being overly concerned if his Argentinian partner misses a putt?
But Americans love team sport and they love winning and this invention, which started in 1994, has fitted the bill admirably on both counts. Out of 13 encounters, they have won 11…
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