Cover star Chris Gotterup shares an honest look at the swing thoughts, misses and practice habits he’s working through, reminding us that even tour winners battle the same frustrations as everyday golfers.

We also explore the evolving world of professional golf, from Luis Masaveau’s move to LIV Golf to The Undercover Pro’s candid take on life beyond the PGA Tour rumour mill. Behind the scenes, we examine the changing face of tour life through the lens of the European Tour Performance Institute and the realities of making a living as a golf professional.

Closer to home, Golf During a Conflict looks at the resilience of the Middle East golf scene, while our travel features visit Al Mouj Golf and Shinnecock Hills Golf Club ahead of the 2026 U.S. Open.

Instruction remains central, with lessons from J. J. Spaun, Aaron Rai and Phil Mickelson, plus our 2026 Hot List guide to the year’s best golf balls. We also continue celebrating regional golf through The Gulf Club and standout performances from across the Middle East.

All this and plenty more in the June 2026 edition of Golf Digest Middle East.

The issue is again free to our loyal audience. You can scroll through the ISSUU link provided here or download it to your favourite device for later. Alternatively, pick up a copy at your local golf club. Whatever option you take, we hope you enjoy the read.

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Furyk was among those in attendance for Sunday’s Munster SHC clash between Limerick Senior Hurling Team and Tipperary Senior Hurling Team alongside Limerick supporter and Adare Manor owner JP McManus.

The former major winner is currently in Ireland to continue preparations ahead of golf’s biggest team event, which will be staged in County Limerick in September 2027.

While the visit centred around Ryder Cup planning, Furyk admitted he had already been trying to familiarise himself with hurling before arriving in Ireland as he was interviewed by Sporting LK after the game.

“First match ever. I’ve kind of been watching a little GAA+ in the States, trying to get ready and figure out the rules, understand the game,” Furyk said after the game.

“A high scoring game today, right? Five goals, 42 points, so kind of a big deal. It’s really fun to watch. These guys are amazing athletes and it’s a fun sport.”

“They call it the fastest field sport in the world. You hear that, but to see it live you really get an appreciation for it.

“I’m just amazed at the distance they score from. Folks hanging off them, trying to hook them, throwing a ball up, wheel around and then boom, awkward angles and difficult shots. I’m impressed.”

The American Ryder Cup captain also joked that he may now have adopted a new team while visiting Limerick.

“I’m going to try and keep up with this team, I’m now a Limerick fan,” he said.

“Folks were supporting their teams but they were polite. Even the Tipp fans that came, I heard a little cheer from the folks that were here.

“I know Limerick is excited about the rest of the season, they’ve got a lot going on and a chance to do well in the All-Ireland.”

Furyk’s visit comes as preparations ramp up for the 100th anniversary Ryder Cup at Adare Manor from September 13–19, 2027.

Tickets for the event are available through official channels, with general admission match day tickets priced at €499, while practice day tickets range from €89 to €179. The global public ballot opens on June 3.

Since 2000, Europe has won nine of the last twelve Ryder Cups. European captain Luke Donald also visited Adare Manor last month as preparations for the tournament continued.

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Colsaerts, 43, looked ice cool in the opening round at Rinkven International G.C. in Antwerp, wearing a Royal Melbourne hat—a nod to his Australian wife Rachel’s heritage—while carding a commendable one-over-par 72.

Then Friday morning arrived. A wave of emotions struck the likeable Brussels native with the velocity of one of his prodigious drives. With the 36-hole cut projected at two under, Colsaerts, now a full-time commentator on LIV Golf, was cognizant it could be his final round.

“Because [retirement] has been brewing for a couple of years, it had been OK until this morning,” Colsaerts told Golf Digest via phone before his second round. “If I don’t shoot 68, I might not play on the weekend. And having played 18 holes only three times this year, the odds are probably against me.

Not surprisingly under the circumstances, Colsaerts has become introspective about about his career—three wins, a Ryder Cup appearance in 2012, €10.7 million in career earnings, one of 50 players to reach 500 starts on the European Tour after his debut in 1998.

“I woke up this morning and you start to think of what your parents have allowed you to do; to live your dreams. You think of Rachel holding the fort at home and raising our two kids when I’m not at home. Her having to deal with all the paperwork that I’m incapable of doing. You can’t do this on your own.

“When you come from a street in the middle of Brussels, and you end up on the biggest stages of the game, idolised by kids and weekend golfers, [you realise] it’s been an absolute dream come true.”

Aside from being a quick-witted, charismatic personality, Colsaerts won over a legion of fans with booming drives that earned him the nickname, “the Belgian bomber.”

“I’m so grateful,” Colsaerts said of golf in general, and the fans. “The faces along the way, wherever it is, are really heartwarming. [I] come from a small country, and so when we have somebody that shines at something, we kind of have a soft spot for them. And also because I’ve always tried to be genuine, I’ve never forgotten where I come from and I’m a proud Belgian. I think that’s why the reception this week has been really overwhelming.

“You realise you’ve made a mark on people. People have been following you and your career. You realise you’ve been a part of people’s lives, or at least the ones that are into golf.”

His career highlights added legitimacy to his popularity.

Colsaerts’ three DP World Tour wins came at the Volvo China Open, Volvo World Matchplay and the French Open. He finished T-7 at the 2012 Open Championship at Royal Lytham and T-10 at the 2013 U.S. Open at Merion.

Nicolas Colsaerts laughs with good friend Marcel Siem and the caddies in his pairing during the first round of the Soudal Open. JONAS ROOSENS

He is perhaps better known for teaming up with Lee Westwood to defeat Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker in their four-ball match at the 2012 Ryder Cup at Medinah. Colsaerts pinpointed Europe’s “Miracle at Medinah” victory that week as his career highlight.

“The Ryder Cup, afterwards, not during, because you’re in the heat of battle and the eye of the cyclone and you don’t realise what’s happening,” Colsaerts said. “But afterwards, being recognised as somebody who has made an impression and who has a line on this CV that not a lot of people can brag about is something to be extremely proud of. [The European team] has these numbers for their Ryder Cup players like they did with the British [and Irish] Lions [in rugby], and I’m No. 147, which is a maximum break at snooker.”

Colsaerts got a first sip of the farewell tour last fall when he made his 500th DP World Tour appearance at the Alfred Dunhill Links event at St. Andrews. He enjoyed an emotional walk up the 18th at the Old Course with wife Rachel and their children. That goodbye tour also included the French Open, which he won in 2019, and competitive appearances in Australia and Mauritius.

But Colsaerts made sure, between commentary at LIV events, that the historic Belgian Open (first held in 1910) this week was the final leg of his globe-trotting send off.

If Friday’s second round was to be final 18 holes on the DP World Tour, Colsaerts was at least flanked by close friends as playing partners: Germany’s Marcel Siem and Frenchman Alex Levy.

“My mission this week was really to enjoy every part of the week, fill myself up and actually realise what you’ve mattered to all these [fans] at home in Belgium,” Colsaerts said. “I’m playing alongside Marcel, who has been my best friend on tour for a quarter of a century. So many flashbacks come to mind; celebrating [our successes], or missing a cut somewhere around the world on a Friday night, or flying and playing together, or having arguments together about the sport we love.

“Alexander is also somebody I’ve become extremely close to, someone with his heart in the right place. I couldn’t have dreamed for a better sendoff.”

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Furyk only recently was chosen to lead the U.S. team again after serving as captain in 2018 in Paris. On Wednesday at the PGA Championship at Aronimink Golf Club, the former U.S. Open champion noted that changes almost certainly will be made to the player qualifying process.

“Everything’s working off money. The purses are so out of whack,” Furyk said. “You know, when just the role of [money] in golf and the tour has changed so much the landscape in the last five years, and so we really need to take a look at kind of a fair assessment of how to identify some simulations.”

Paul Azinger changed the qualifying system in 2008 to award points based on earnings and abandoned the outdated structure in which points were accumulated for top-10 finishes. He also expanded wildcard picks from two to four players after Jack Nicklaus lobbied to add captains picks for the 1989 edition following the Americans’ first home loss in 1987 at Muirfield Village Golf Club. Nicklaus’ team was made up of the top 10 in points (via top-10 finishes) and winners of the U.S. Open and PGA Championship.

Azinger’s logic was simple when he altered the process, arguing that “only two things make guys choke—money and prestige.” Therefore, his automatic qualifiers had been playing well under pressure.”

Money is now a poor barometer for assessing clutch play. There is so much money in golf—71 players already have surpassed $1 million this year on the PGA Tour—and there is such a considerable disparity in purses among majors, signature events and other tournaments that a straight cash-to-points scheme seems, well, pointless.

In the past several Ryder Cup cycles, the majors from off years counted in team standings. That might still be the case, even though two of the year’s four majors will be completed by the end of this weekend. “I don’t think there’s any issue with a retroactive [system] because there’s already been a precedent set. We already done that in the past,” he said.

Furyk didn’t say how the points could be recalculated, again expressing his intent to have numbers crunched and simulations conducted. He added that he would retain six captains picks, which has been the number since the 2021 Ryder Cup.

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Don’t get it wrong—this wasn’t a Phil Mickelson-in-Gleneagles-style scorched earth campaign. Furyk was polite, and he didn’t name names (at times he was so careful that he slipped into equivocations like, “instead of saying something’s not quite right, I think I would say we could definitely be doing a lot better job”), but implicit in his captaincy goals was the idea that America had, at some point, lost its way.

For example, we can look at the four times he used the word “improve”:

“I think there’s a lot of things logistically that we can do that we can improve on our organization.”

“Then I really look at it from a long-term perspective, and something we really need to improve on and get better at. I like to say we need to create a blueprint.”

“The same thing applies with our analytics, numbers crunching. It’s the application that becomes very important. That’s something that we need to look at and improve on. Surely that doesn’t fall totally on Scouts [Consulting, the team’s analytics advisors]. That falls on captains as well and me included.”

“I think we look at some of the leaders on our team to improve what we do and our communication skills.”

On paper, this may look underwhelming, but within each of these statements is commentary on some of the team’s obvious deficiencies both at Bethpage and in the decades preceding it: The lack of leadership continuity, the application of statistics, galvanising the passion of American players, and a general long-term logistical plan for how to match Europe’s decades-long (and constantly self-improving) template.

Scott Taetsch/PGA of America

When Furyk’s captaincy was announced, I wrote that it was the best possible choice because it represented a return to the post-Gleneagles era of detail-oriented rebuilding that led to the blowout victories at Hazeltine and Whistling Straits. In the midst of that, Furyk lost a lopsided Ryder Cup in Paris, and while that loss represents the centerpiece argument of his critics, it’s important to recognize the elements of bad luck that went into that loss, along with the general difficulty in winning in Europe at all, and to remind ourselves that Furyk was a key member of the task force and an equal partner with Davis Love III and Steve Stricker in the architecture of the home victories.

Throwing that structure away with the Keegan Bradley was a foreseeable disaster, and contrary to my expectations, Furyk addressed that captaincy directly.

“We brought Keegan in even later than this last year,” he said. He had less than 18 months to prepare. And that’s a guy who never even served as vice captain … I think we could have put Keegan in a much better position last year.”

Yes, precisely. Furyk’s awareness of that mistake, and his emphasis on continuity, represents a heartening throwback to the last time there was optimism in the U.S. system.

On the question of analytics, he pushed back aggressively on the notion that it was a secondary concern for the Americans, and while he seemed to signal uncertainty as to whether Scouts Consulting would return for Adare Manor—he said the decision would come in the next month—he didn’t sound like the numbers-skeptics whose disdain has seen America fall well behind Edoardo Molinari and the European analytics crew, and he acknowledged the need to study the implementation of the data—the “application” that takes it from a computer screen to real-life partnerships, and playing order, and pin and tee placements, and fairway widths, and rough heights, and etc.

Furyk, who turned 56 on Tuesday, said he planned to make three trips to Ireland this year, and in a small huddle afterward he said he’d be a fixture at PGA Tour events (up to 12 in 2027), and will continue the practice of using PGA Tour groups to place potential future pairings together, but would not be taking a spot in the field the way previous captains have done. The player stipend will continue, and a new points system designed to fix the problem with wildly varying purses will be implemented later this year.

He also pointed to Paul Azinger as a captain who had a special ability to get his players to buy into the team’s success long before the Cup took place, and that a massive part of his own job was fostering that buy-in. On the topic of team composition, he spoke at length about what went wrong with this captain’s picks in Paris (Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson, and Bryson DeChambeau combined for an 0-9 record), and that he’d be “more prepared and willing” to make hard decisions if faced with similar choices in Ireland.

Andrew Redington

In short, if you’re someone like me who believes the American team has veered from a philosophy of continuity that gives them their only shot to compete with the Europeans in the decades to come, Furyk’s comments were a breath of fresh air. He has a sense of history, a sense of his own side’s mistakes, and, in my opinion, a sense of what needs to change.

And now, a splash of cold water: Furyk’s press conference ended with a glance to the European team, and the work already underway at Adare courtesy of Luke Donald and his team.

“I know there’s already been some changes made to grassing and rough lines so that they have some options on setup,” he said.

It’s a small detail, but it’s also an ominous one when looked at in the context of Europe’s formidable machine. They’re already laying the groundwork for subtle course changes they might want to take 18 months from now, and when it comes to Donald’s obsessive preparation, this is undoubtedly just the tip of the iceberg.

It lays bare a truth that Furyk will have to face throughout his captaincy: No matter how hard he tries, and how much he improves, he will be up against arguably the most motivated team in professional sports, and the Europeans will be determined to try harder and to improve more. And they’ll be at home.

This is why I’ve called Furyk’s captaincy a rebuilding project, and to some extent a noble sacrifice on his part—it is highly unlikely the Americans will win at Adare Manor, he may end up as the only 0-2 captain in U.S. Ryder Cup history, and the work he puts in may not bear fruit for years … and when it does, nobody will think to give him the credit.

But he won’t be thinking that way between now and Adare Manor; he’ll be out to win. And though the road to doing so is long and steep, the messages he sent on Wednesday gave every indication that he understands the assignment, is ready to address the shortcomings of the past, has the mandate to implement his vision, and can push the Americans toward their eventual dawn.

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We learned that on Wednesday as one of the team’s vice captains, Kevin Kisner, told a hilarious tale on the latest episode of Barstool’s Fore Play podcast. As Kisner revealed, captain Keegan Bradley set up a group chat once the American team was set. But one player, Bryson DeChambeau, didn’t have an iPhone, which made sharing certain things with him difficult. (Isn’t there always that one person on the chat with a different phone?)

To Bryson’s credit, he went out and got a new team-friendly phone, but that led to the next problem. Somehow, he managed to give Bradley the wrong number, and, well, take it away, Kiz!

Kiz tells an unbelievable story about a RANDOM PERSON getting in the Ryder Cup group chat because Bryson didn’t have an iPhone pic.twitter.com/AWerKAyphU

— Fore Play (@ForePlayPod) May 7, 2026

“So some random person in America is getting all these comments from the Ryder Cup team,” Kisner says in the clip. “So that was a hilarious start to our Ryder Cup.”

Hilarious, indeed. Although, you know who’s also laughing? That well-oiled machine known as Team Europe.

“I think the guy, if I remember correctly, like, ‘Hey, I don’t know what any of this is, but good luck to y’all,'” Kisner continues with the tale. “I think somebody even commented back, ‘Whatever, Bryson, funny joke.’ And then the guy was like, ‘No, seriously, I don’t know who these people are.”

Let’s hope Team USA gets this straightened out before next year’s Ryder Cup in Ireland. Captain Jim Furyk already has his first task.

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The DP World Tour confirmed the news in a statement released Tuesday, saying: “The DP World Tour and Jon Rahm have come to an agreement on conditional releases to play in conflicting tournaments on LIV Golf during the remainder of its 2026 season. This involves payment of all outstanding fines accrued from 2024 to date, along with participation in agreed DP World Tour tournaments (outside the majors) in the remainder of the 2026 season.”

The agreement ends the uncertainty that had cast doubt over Rahm’s eligibility ahead of the 2027 Ryder Cup. Speaking ahead of LIV Golf Virginia, Rahm revealed that both sides made concessions to reach a compromise, bringing clarity to his status after previously withdrawing an appeal against sanctions without settling the dispute.

Rahm had been the only one among nine European LIV players to reject earlier conditions, objecting to an increased requirement of six non-major DP World Tour appearances instead of the standard four. His position softened in recent weeks, culminating in a deal that ensures compliance with Tour regulations while allowing him to continue competing on LIV.

The 2023 Masters champion has impressed in LIV Golf in 2026, recording two victories and three runner-up finishes, lifting him to No. 21 in the Official World Golf Ranking.

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#NEW — 2027 U.S. Ryder Cup Captain Jim Furyk has announced from the Kentucky Derby that Stewart Cink & Justin Leonard have been named vice-captains. pic.twitter.com/qMXpCNuwFc

— NUCLR GOLF (@NUCLRGOLF) May 2, 2026

Cink was in the running for the captaincy itself after Tiger Woods removed his name from contention. The 2009 Open champion played in five consecutive Ryder Cups, including the American upset at Valhalla in 2008.

Leonard, also a former Open winner, sank the winning putt at the 1999 Ryder Cup at Brookline. Furyk has three vice captain picks left should he want them.

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This month, we lead with cover star Robert MacIntyre, who opens up on returning home, the bonds forged through the Ryder Cup, and what it takes to perform under the brightest lights.

Elsewhere, we explore golf’s expanding global footprint. In Baku, Dreamland Golf Club is redefining destination golf, while in Dubai, Discovery Dunes showcases the seamless blend of design, exclusivity and luxury that continues to shape the region’s appeal.

Our Voices section offers a range of perspectives: Neal Shipley shares his personal journey, the debate around Brooks Koepka’s place in the professional game continues, and Jerry Tarde assesses Brian Rolapp’s challenging new role. Alex Myers also introduces the inspiring story of Chaz Bowker and his unconventional route into adaptive golf.

Innovation remains a key theme, with Rory Flanagan and PLATFORM Golf pushing the indoor game forward here in Abu Dhabi. Instruction, as ever, is central—featuring insights from Cam Young, Michael Kolar and more—while our Hot List, travel pages and Gulf Club coverage round out another diverse issue.

All this and plenty more in the May 2026 edition of Golf Digest Middle East.

The issue is again free to our loyal audience. You can scroll through the ISSUU link provided here or download it to your favourite device for later. Alternatively, pick up a copy at your local golf club. Whatever option you take, we hope you enjoy the read.

The post Get your FREE May 2026 edition of Golf Digest Middle East here! appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Stop me if you’ve heard this all before.

Yes, this isn’t the first time the PGA of America has put its faith in Furyk to deliver a road W. He was in charge at the 2018 Ryder Cup, where the heavily favoured U.S. team lost by seven points at Le Golf National.

You could make the argument that Furyk was the victim of bad luck back in Paris, and subsequently, he led the U.S. to a decisive win at the 2024 Presidents Cup. Those are very different events played under different circumstances. But for Furyk to have any chance in Ireland, the 55-year-old needs to have learned a few lessons from that fateful week in France.

Don’t get out-prepped

A lot has been made in recent years about the details and work the European Ryder Cup team puts into its process. From bedsheets to ice baths, from virtual reality headsets to intensive statistical modelling, Luke Donald and his team have convinced many that they have found an edge, explaining how the Europeans have won nine of the last 12 Ryder Cups.

In 2018, the European team appeared to have an advantage before a shot was even hit at Le Golf National. That is because the course was also the familiar home of the French Open. The 2018 edition of the DP World Tour event was played three months before the Ryder Cup and while eight of the eventual European team teed it up that week (including Alex Noren, who won the event), only Justin Thomas from the U.S. side played.

FRANCK FIFE

While the majority of the Americans did eventually make trips to Le Golf National, mainly around the Open in mid-July, Thomas was the lone pro to get competitive reps on the course. He finished in the top 10 at the French Open and went on to be the top points earner at the Ryder Cup, with a 4-1-0 record.

While it’s unlikely Adare Manor will host a DP World Tour event before the 2027 Ryder Cup, and while several American players have played the course at the 2022 JP McManus Pro-Am (including Xander Schauffele, who won that 36-hole event), prepping for and scouting the course will be a key part of Furyk’s captaincy.

The course in Ireland has been closed since August last year, with significant work and changes being made ahead of the Ryder Cup. It’s due to open next month, and I expect Furyk will be keen to see it himself and arrange a scouting trip for the players likely to make his team.

Getting his backroom team right

Another part of a captain’s preparations is building out a support group that can make his job easier. It’s why Donald confirmed three weeks ago that Edoardo Molinari, his right-hand man and statistical expert, will again serve as vice captain on the European team in 2027. The pair were at Adare Manor last week walking and scouting the course.

In 2018, Furyk did similar, announcing Davis Love III as a vice captain soon after his own appointment in January 2017. Love had won as captain in 2016 and the continuity seemed smart. However, Furyk then named Steve Stricker and Tiger Woods as a vice captains in February 2018. Of course, Tiger would go on to play in Paris, meaning that three weeks before the first session, Furyk had to pivot and announce three more vice captains in Matt Kuchar, Zach Johnson and David Duval.

ERIC FEFERBERG

Hindsight is 20/20, as the saying goes, and it’s easy to compare that preparation with Thomas Bjorn and the European team in 2018. Bjorn announced Robert Karlsson as a vice captain in May 2017, then a year later but still four months out from the Ryder Cup added Luke Donald, Pádraig Harrington, Graeme McDowell and Lee Westwood.

After the “Will he? Won’t he?” headlines that surrounded Keegan Bradley’s participation in the 2025 Ryder Cup, expect to see a clearer, earlier process from the U.S. team this time around.

Re-evaluating his captain’s picks

As Bill Parcells, the Hall of Fame NFL coach, once said, “You are what your record says you are.” In the case of Furyk and the 2018 Ryder Cup, the record of his captain’s picks tells a clear, albeit rough, story. His four captain’s selections went a combined 2-10-0.

Jamie Squire

Now I’ll give Furyk some credit (and here’s where that unlucky idea plays out). At the time, at least two of his picks seemed inevitable. Bryson DeChambeau had just won back-to-back playoff events, and Tony Finau was a top-20 player in the world, having the best season of his career with three straight top-10 finishes before Furyk selected him with his fourth and final captain’s pick after the BMW Championship.

Tiger was in the midst of a comeback that would eventually see him win the 2019 Masters. He had finished runner-up to Brooks Koepka at the PGA Championship in August, led the Open Championship with nine holes to play at Carnoustie before losing out to Francesco Molinari (a sign of things to come at Le Golf National, sadly), and he would end up winning the Tour Championship the week before the Ryder Cup. It would have been a big call to leave Woods at home.

Then there’s Phil Mickelson. A staple in every Ryder Cup dating back to 1995, Mickelson would ultimately finish his Ryder Cup playing career on the 16th tee at Le Golf National, shaking Francesco Molinari’s hand after conceding his match and the Ryder Cup, shortly after watching his ball splash into the water on the par 3. Mickelson had won in 2018, at the WGC-Mexico Championship, but hadn’t finished in the top 10 in any of his last 11 starts before Furyk picked him on Sept. 4.

So, you can easily squint and see why Furyk picked the four players he did—all were ranked in the top 25 in the world at the time—you can make the argument he didn’t bring the right type of players. Le Golf National is known to be one of the hardest and tightest layouts on the DP World Tour. Bjorn and his team had narrowed fairways and landing areas and it seemed obvious to many within the game that accuracy was going to be key there..

While Finau, Woods, Mickelson and DeChambeau were all great players, none would be described as accurate, especially off the tee. And it showed. The latter three failed to contribute even a half point across the five sessions of the 2027 Ryder Cup.

Who should Furyk have trusted instead?

Alan Harvey – SNS Group

How about Xander Schauffele? A two-time major champion now, he was a two-time PGA Tour winner at the time and the 2017 Tour Championship winner. He was a top-20 player in the world, finished runner-up at the Open in 2018, as well as the Players, which many equated as the closest PGA Tour test to Le Golf National.

Or how about Kuchar? At the time, one of the most consistent and accurate players in the game, coming off a solid winning performance at the 2016 Ryder Cup.

Regardless of who the contenders are for the 2027 team, I expect Furyk and his team will do their best to find better course fits this time around.

Get smarter with foursomes pairings

You could argue that Europe won the 2018 Ryder Cup Friday afternoon. Despite a fast start from the Americans, who led all four matches in the opening fourballs at one point and eventually won the session 3-1, they were swept in the Friday foursomes.

Furyk raised some eyebrows when he released his alternate-shot pairings, teaming Mickelson and DeChambeau specifically. The final four holes at Le Golf National play back and forth in a stadium-like setting, with high mounding all round, custom designed for fans. Those fans, however, didn’t see Phil or Bryson on Friday afternoon. Nor did they see Jordan Spieth or Justin Thomas. Both pairs lost their foursome matches, 5 and 4. The other two matches finished on the 16th green and the Europeans had taken control of the Ryder Cup.

Jamie Squire

Look at the European pairings and you can see what kind of test Bjorn expected from Le Golf National: Henrik Stenson-Justin Rose, Francisco Molinari-Tommy Fleetwood, Sergio Garcia-Noren, Ian Poulter-Rory McIlroy. It was clear that accuracy tee-to-green was the requirement to success. Yet, no one told that to Furyk.

As we saw at Bethpage last year, with the much-questioned pairing of Collin Morikawa and Harris English, how a captain chooses his foursomes lineup is often what many consider to be the biggest decision he makes. In Ireland, Furyk will hope to do better than 2-6 foursome records he endured.

Win the locker room

The chemistry players have in the Ryder Cup is often associated with how they pair up in matches, but it’s clear that chemistry on and off the course is required to come together in the sport’s ultimate team format.

In 2018, Furyk and his team never appeared to gel like they might have hoped. After defeat but before the team plane had even crossed back west over Atlantic Ocean, Patrick Reed vented to the New York Times about the management of the team, described it as a “buddy system” and giving opinions like “for somebody as successful in the Ryder Cup as I am, I don’t think it’s smart to sit me twice.”

Jamie Squire

A subsequent article also came out just hours after a blow-up between Koepka and Dustin Johnson in the team hotel on Sunday night. As someone who witnessed the aftermath of that, in person, in the hallways of the Trianon Palace hotel, I can confirm it didn’t appear like team chemistry was strong, albeit shortly after a disappointing defeat.

With the likes of Reed and Koepka now leaving LIV Golf and looking to integrate back into the PGA Tour, perhaps the early signs for Furyk and the 2027 Ryder Cup are positive. However, managing both the players and team room will be high on the captain’s to-do list in Ireland.

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