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Who would make your 2016 European Ryder Cup team?

By: | Mon 26 Oct 2015


Post by Matt Holbrook 


With just 328 days (or a little over 7500+ hours, 470000+ minutes, but who’s counting?) to go until the 2016 Ryder Cup Ryder Cupgets started at Hazeltine I decided to have a look back at the team that retained at Gleneagles and a look forward to the potential team that will head across the pond next year.

So let’s start with the 12 hero’s that successfully defended in 2014:

  • Thomas Bjorn           
  • Victor Dubuisson      
  • Jamie Donaldson   
  • Stephen Gallacher   
  • Sergio Garcia         
  • Martin Kaymer         
  • Graeme McDowell
  • Rory McIlroy
  • Justin Rose
  •   Henrik Stenson
  •  Lee Westwood

As much as I love (Literally LOVE) every single player on the above list I have to be brutally honest with myself and ask just how many of those guys will be lining up stateside? There seems to be a changing of the guard in European golf right now and the young guns snapping at these guys heel are really going to be putting some pressure on.
Right now, 3 maybe 4, of the above list would make the class of 2016.

Rory McIlroy, Henrik Stenson, Justin Rose and Martin Kaymer would be my 4, but as things stand (yes there is still a long way to go) only 2 of those 4 are in automatic qualifying spots – Stenson and Rose.

Those 2 would currently be joined by these chaps, and as things stand who could argue with any of them making the team?

  • Matthew Fitzpatrick
  • Thorbjorn Olesen
  • Soren Kjeldsen
  • Chris Wood
  • Lee Slattery
  • Thomas Pieters
  • Rikard Karlberg

We can drill a bit further down to players such as Eddie Pepperell, Andy Sullivan, Shane Lowry, Alexander Levy, Bernd Wiesberger, Tommy Fleetwood and Danny Willett all comfortably holding their own on the European Tour and would be far from surprise names at the top of any leaderboard, the competition for places will be both exciting and nail biting.

9 players will qualify automatically – 4 from European Points and 5 from world points - I also don’t envy captain Clarke’s when it comes to him selecting his 3 wildcard picks. Youth or Experience, Length or Finesse. Good luck with that one Darren.

So I’m going to stick my neck on the line, and welcome others to do so below as well, and make a prediction at exactly how our side will look when proceedings get underway next September. Don’t ask me to go into details of who is coming from which list but here goes.

  1. Rory McIlroy         
  2. Justin Rose
  3. Henrik Stenson   
  4. Martyn Kaymer   
  5. Matthew Fitzpatrick
  6.  Andy Sullivan
  7.  Shane Lowry
  8. Bernd Wiesberger
  9.  Soren Kjeldsen

3 Picks –

  • Thomas Pieters
  • Thorbjorn Olesen
  • Alexander Levy

So over to you guys.

What do you think of Matt's team? Is he on the money? We would love to hear you thoughts and feel free to make your own predictions by comenting below…………..


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