KISSES ALL ROUND!
Puckering up, it’s joy for Europe’s heroic golfers
EUROPE’S jubilant golfers celebrate with their wives and girlfriends yesterday after they routed the US in the Ryder Cup.
Huge cheers broke out from 60,000 spectators in Paris as they reclaimed the trophy they lost to the Americans two years ago.
Irish golfing hero Rory McIlroy was among the stars mobbed by fans and teammates as US veteran Phil Mickelson conceded his game 17½ to 10½.
The players were joined on the fairway by their partners, with Spanish stalwart Sergio Garcia in tears as he embraced wife Angela and Italian Francesco Molinari kissing wife Valentina.
Also there to join in the celebrations were Irish team vice captains Pádraig Harrington and Graeme McDowell and their other halves.
And Europe’s triumphant players enjoyed some fun at the expense of an American journalist after their victory at Le Golf National. Golf.com writer Alan Shipnuck wrote a column last year in which he predicted the United States would ‘roll to victory in Paris’ and set the stage for more than a decade of ‘blowouts’ in the biennial contest.
And the likes of McIlroy and Garcia were not about to let Shipnuck forget it as he sat in the winning team’s press conference following their seven-point victory on Sunday.
‘We’ve known each other for a long, long time and we get along well,’ Rory McIlroy said in answer to a question about European team solidarity.
‘I think collectively, we all have one question: Where is Alan Shipnuck?’
That drew cheers from McIlroy’s team-mates and Garcia added: ‘I don’t know how good a predictor you are.’
Shipnuck later took to Twitter to praise Thomas Bjorn’s men, saying: ‘Sixth row in the press conference, and I raised my hand and took the deserved hazing from the whole team. The European players are great fun – they’ve always understood that my column was a bit of cheekiness.
‘[Ian Poulter] spent the whole press conference winking at me while taking sips. I nabbed his champagne glass as a souvenir. Let me state for record this Euro team was amazing and they richly deserve the Cup. Cheers.’
Among those being carried away on fans’ shoulders in Paris was golf’s newest hero – 27-yearold British player Tommy Fleetwood.
The long-haired Merseysider had started the tournament as a relative unknown. That all changed when he became the competition’s first debutant to win his first four matches.
He said yesterday: ‘I’m a little bit emotional right now. I’m just glad we’ve done our job for the team. We’ve had a great time.’
Two years ago Fleetwood was struggling, having fallen out of golf’s top 180 in the midst of a long losing streak he said was ‘killing my game off’.
He credits his wife Clare Craig, a sports manager, with saving his career, and is now ranked 12th in the world.
‘I’m a little bit emotional’