90. GB&I Lose The 2018 St. Andrews Trophy Match

27th July 2018

The 32nd St. Andrews Trophy match was played on Thursday 26th and Friday 27th July at Linna Golf in Finland.

Like the Walker Cup the St. Andrews Trophy is played over two days and consists of match play foursomes and singles matches.

The Continent of Europe beat Great Britain and Ireland (GB&I) 15.5 – 9.5 today.

GB&I entered the final day leading 7 – 5 but ended up being comprehensively outplayed by an inspired European team who won the Day 2 games 10.5 – 2.5 to run away with the match.

This was just the sixth time Europe had won the St. Andrews Trophy and their 6 point margin of victory was their best ever.

For more detail on the match please take a look at my preview and report on GolfBible – The St. Andrews Trophy Match – 2018 Preview, Reports & Results

The Continent of Europe (Photo: European Golf Association)

The R&A Selection Committee, including Non-Playing Captain Craig WATSON, announced GB&I’s nine man team for the match on 16th July. This was exactly the same team that I would have picked.

Todd CLEMENTS (21) – England
Robin DAWSON (22) – Ireland
David HAGUE (21) – England
Matthew JORDAN (22) – England
John MURPHY (20) – Ireland
Gian-Marco PETROZZI (21) – England
Nick POPPLETON (24) – England
Conor PURCELL (21) – Ireland
Mitch WAITE (23) – England

Following last September’s record breaking 19 – 7 defeat by the United States in the Walker Cup this heavy loss was another sobering experience for GB&I’s leading players.

The fact the European team was also weaker than may have been expected due to a number of their leading players competing at this week’s Porsche European Open on the European Tour or preferring to play in amateur events in the Unites States arguably makes the result even harder to take.

In The R&A’s match report GB&I Captain Craig WATSON said: “The team is obviously very disappointed but if you look at the scoring by the Continent of Europe you can see we were up against a very high standard of golf. This is the level that the players need to aspire to and achieve and when they look back on the performance there will be many learning points to take away. If you are to win a match like this you obviously need to make your fair share of putts when it matters. We just couldn’t match the Continent of Europe today. I don’t think we were complacent.”

In conclusion it would appear that the best GB&I team we could put out were simply outplayed by the Europeans, albeit only on the final day.

It should be noted that Matthew JORDAN (ENG) certainly left Finland with his reputation intact after winning three of his four matches.

The 2019 Walker Cup match at Royal Liverpool G.C. is now just over 400 days away and the GB&I group clearly need to see some improvement between now and then if that match is to be competitive.

It will be interesting to see how many of the nine players who played this week are still amateur in a year’s time and, if they are, whether they have maintained their form sufficiently to be selected for our Walker Cup team.

Earlier this week The R&A announced that the 2020 St. Andrews Trophy match will be played at Royal Porthcawl G.C. in South Wales on 23-24 July.

ME.

Copyright © Mark Eley. All rights reserved.

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