{"id":444127,"date":"2025-09-22T21:14:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T21:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/444127\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T21:14:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T21:14:12","slug":"europe-better-now-than-during-2023-ryder-cup-triumph-says-luke-donald-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/444127\/","title":{"rendered":"Europe better now than during 2023 Ryder Cup triumph, says Luke Donald \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Europe captain Luke Donald<\/a> believes his Ryder Cup<\/a> team are better now than when they won in Rome two years ago.<\/p>\n

Europe swept to a comprehensive 16.5-10.5 victory over the United States in Italy in 2023 and returning skipper Donald has picked 11 of the 12 players again for this year\u2019s instalment at Bethpage Black in New York.<\/p>\n

The only fresh face is Rasmus Hojgaard, who replaces his twin brother Nicolai and was also part of the set-up at the Marco Simone Club.<\/p>\n

With the likes Rory McIlroy<\/a>, Justin Rose, Tommy Fleetwood, Robert MacIntyre and Viktor Hovland regularly competing at the top of the game, Donald believes his European team have improved.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think statistically there are some guys who are a lot better players than they were in Rome,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we understand that it\u2019s going to be a big challenge, but I am very excited about my team, where we are, the form we have coming into this and I\u2019m excited about getting going on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very similar team, which is unusual. It\u2019s never happened in the history of our Ryder Cup teams in Europe, to have 11 come back. So we have a lot of cohesion.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think part of a captain\u2019s job is to try and form the team. It\u2019s to try and get these guys together and kind of bonding and being a team.<\/p>\n

\u201cI certainly haven\u2019t had to work that hard with these guys because of what we did two years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven Rasmus was on the buggy for Nicolai and spent time there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Europe will have to be at their best to retain the trophy, with seven of the US team occupying the top 10 in the world rankings.<\/p>\n

Number one Scottie Scheffler<\/a> is their star player after an incredible year and Donald described opposite number Keegan Bradley<\/a>\u2019s side as a \u201cbunch of superstars\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sure the US are very strong too,\u201d the 47-year-old said. \u201cYou just look at the talent the US have, they have the best player in the world. He\u2019s doing incredible things.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a bunch of superstars, as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

History is against Europe, who have lost three of the last four meetings on American soil and needed the \u2018Miracle of Medinah\u2019 in 2012 to claim an unlikely win.<\/p>\n

Their last outing on this side of the Atlantic ended in a record 19-9 hammering at Whistling Straits four years ago, while defeats at Hazeltine in 2016 and Valhalla in 2012 were not close either.<\/p>\n

Donald was dressed in salmon pink on Monday, in homage to the historic 1987 win in Ohio \u2013 Europe\u2019s first victory on American soil.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s always important to rally around something,\u201d he said. \u201cWe always have things that we come up with that are important to us.<\/p>\n

\u201cHistory and our unity and celebrating what we\u2019ve done in the past and the legends that have kind of come before us is really important.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is going to be a difficult challenge. We haven\u2019t come close to winning three out of the last four away Ryder Cups. It\u2019s not been very close at all. That\u2019s my job to bridge that gap.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut we have won quite a few times. We\u2019ve won four times away since 1987 and come close a few other times as well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Europe captain Luke Donald believes his Ryder Cup team are better now than when they won in Rome…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":444128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[2000,299,5187,83247,83846,4321],"class_list":{"0":"post-444127","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-european","11":"tag-keegan-bradley","12":"tag-luke-donald","13":"tag-ryder-cup"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115250021654807905","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}