What is the point of the Presidents Cup?

What is the point of the Presidents Cup? Seriously, somebody please tell me because I haven’t a clue.

Does anybody care who won? Will American golf fans ever stop their boorish behaviour? 

In quick succession, the USA have lost the Ryder Cup, Walker Cup and Solheim Cup. But despite a scare they have, of course, held on to the Presidents Cup.

Brandt Snedeker’s team thought they could just turn up and win. To be honest, I also believed that but they needed a fightback in the singles to secure what I regard as another meaningless success. But who cares about the Presidents Cup?

It is staged in non-Ryder Cup years and sees the USA take on the Internationals, a team of 12 golfers from the rest of the world other than Europe.

The version just staged at Medinah was the 16th - the USA have won 14, there has been one tied match and the Internationals had just one victory.

(Image Credit: Rolex/Chris Turvey)

It is as one-sided as the Ryder Cup was before the contest was expanded to include golfers from Continental Europe. The Ryder Cup has, of course, gone from strength to strength and is now the biggest team event in golf.

The format for the Presidents Cup has been tinkered with several times but is essentially a mirror of the Ryder Cup. It is, however, spread over four days with a total of 30 points up for grabs.

It is a match that is played in good spirit and reminds me of a meeting of an old boys club. When all is said and done, does anybody care about the outcome? 

The draw for the first set of matches, played out in public in front of the TV cameras, left me cold.

The 12 Americans turn up knowing that the result is a forgone conclusion. There is no real passion demonstrated by the fans other than the normal bad behaviour when the visitors played good golf shots. This is normally a four-day victory parade. Of course there are some surprises along the way but the Internationals usually face a thankless and hopeless task.

If you have ever attended a Ryder Cup you will know that the atmosphere is highly charged and often febrile. At the end of the first session of fourballs at Medinah, Wyndham Clark felt compelled to comment on the lack of feeling and passion among the home fans.

There are proper rivalries in the Ryder Cup. 

Players have spoken about struggling to put a tee in the ground because of nerves. 

We have seen gut-wrenching drama, we have seen unbelievable comebacks, heartbreaking losses, unbelievable misses, incredible hole-outs and players nearly coming to blows. 

We have seen players and spectators rushing on to greens. 

We have had players being booed and jeered. We have had fans crossing the boundary and behaving like thugs. We have seen golfers and their families being verbally abused. 

It is an event that has come a long way since the days when GB&I were routinely thrashed by the USA.

The outcome matters. It really matters. 

Rory McIlroy once described it as an exhibition event - he has a very different view now. We have seen both him and Scottie Scheffler reduced to tears after performing poorly, feeling that they have let down their teammates - and the fans. Can you think of any exhibition where that would happen? I know that I can’t.

There is a proper sense of camaraderie among the European players. Many of them grew up together. They have mixed socially on both the DP World and PGA Tours and are close friends. If you have any doubts as to how they feel about one another cast your mind back to the 2025 Tour Championship when Justin Rose and a host of other European golfers stood beside the 18th green to cheer home Tommy Fleetwood as he finally recorded his maiden PGA Tour success. 

Can you imagine Americans doing that?

And how can that possibly exist in a team of Internationals with players hailing from Japan, South Korea, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Colombia, Canada? 

Hideki Matsuyama is notoriously reluctant to speak English so how on earth does he communicate with his teammates? By sign language? Through an interpreter? Who knows? Captain Geoff Ogilvy had little option but to partner one of his best players with another Japanese golfer.

It also made little or no sense to me that Lucas Herbert and Joaquin Niemann were not eligble for the International team. Yes, they are both LIV golfers, but they are clearly good enough to have added something to Geoff Ogilvy’s team and their omission seems pretty petty to me. Niemann won five LIV titles in 2025 and has added a further two this year. Herbert starred at The Open and won the following week’s LIV event in sensational fashion.

So, I ask again: what is the point of the Presidents Cup?