Euro vice-captain calls for huge Ryder Cup change

If Ryder Cup chiefs have plans to mitigate home advantage, they could do worse than consult Edoardo Molinari.

The Italian stats guru will return as a European vice-captain in 2025 after making a winning backroom debut 12 months ago.

And Molinari, 43, is passionate about making one change to the biennial match between Europe and the United States.

Asked on the Fried Egg Golf podcast how he would theoretically build the 2041 Ryder Cup venue, Molinari made his stance clear.

“Honestly, I would set it up in a way that is as neutral as possible, and you cannot really change it too much,” he said.

“I would love to see a Ryder Cup where home advantage – well, I think home advantage is big enough because of the crowd.

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“I think they should take away the course set up from the home team, to be honest. It’s something that can make quite a big difference, as it proved in the last few Ryder Cups.

“It’s difficult enough to play in front of an away crowd, that you don’t also need the course to be set up in favour of the home team.”

Home advantage in golf’s fiercest dust-up is no myth. The home Ryder Cup team has won seven of the last eight matches and ten of the last 12.

And they haven’t exactly been close.

Following Europe’s win in Italy last year, the home team is winning by an average margin of five points.

Much of that has come down to a venue setup bias, with Molinari glad changes have already been made to tackle the advantage.

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“They’ve already taken away quite a few things,” he added. “Ten or 15 years ago, the home team could decide which tees, they could set the pins, sometimes the only ones to know the pins.

“That was obviously too big an advantage, so now you can’t choose which tee box to use, whether you want to move up one or not, you can’t do it.

“You can’t decide on the pins, we’re given the five pins at the beginning of the week that will be used in all the sessions. They don’t tell you Sunday pins or Friday pins, just the five pins, that’s it.”

Those are practices Molinari would keep in place, whilst tweaking the layout to benefit the format.

“I think that’s a very good way to do it,” Molinari added. “And I would try to do pretty much the same on the golf course.

“I’d build a golf course where, ideally, there is only one tee, you can’t move it. And I’d make it a good match play course, where a lot of the holes are reachable par 4’s with water or reachable par 5s with some penalty involved.

“Marco Simone was a great venue because of the back nine. The front nine was so-so and we knew that as we had a lot of data from the Italian open in previous years.

“There were holes you decide to go for it or layup, so a lot of things happening from the eighth hole onwards, and I think that’s a very good trait to have in a Ryder Cup course.”

John Turnbull A graduate of the University of Stirling, John joined the bunkered team in 2023 as a Content Producer, with a responsibility for covering all breaking news, tour news, grassroots content and much more besides. A keen golfer, he plays the majority of his golf at Falkirk Tryst Golf Club. Top of his 'bucket list' is a round of Pebble Beach... ideally in the company of Gareth Bale.