Xander Schauffele has issued a brutal verdict on his own performance at the 2023 Ryder Cup as the Americans turn their attention to Bethpage Black next year.
Of course, the Ryder Cup is more than a year away, but the competition is back in the spotlight following the news that Keegan Bradley has been confirmed as the US team’s new captain, with the 38-year-old set to succeed Zach Johnson in New York.
America have a big point to prove after a terrible time over the first two days in Rome last year, with an impressive showing in the singles making the score a lot closer than it had any right to be.
The visitors did not win a single match on day one, while the score, at one stage, reached 9.5-2.5 in Europe’s favour, with the likes of Scottie Scheffler, Brooks Koepka and Collin Morikawa amongst those who really did not turn up.
Xander Schauffele sums up his 2023 Ryder Cup performance in one word
Xander Schauffele was another who had a torrid time in the Italian capital, losing all three of his matches over the first two days. He did manage to beat Nicolai Hojgaard in the singles as America won four points in a row to create some sort of drama.
And speaking in comments reported by the BBC, Schauffele insisted that the players have to take responsibility for their showing in Rome, with his own performance falling well short of the standards he sets himself.
“When you lose that many cups overseas, you definitely start to get in your own head,” he said.
“Just like I didn’t win a tournament for two years, you look in the mirror and start going, what’s wrong here. That’s a little different, but they are going to point every single direction.
“But at the end of the day us players didn’t play well. I haven’t watched a lot of cups overseas where both teams played well and it was super competitive and teams got beat.
“Myself, I felt like I played awful. I felt like I didn’t show up until the final round and it was already way too late to play good golf at that point.”
Different kind of pressure for US team at Bethpage
What almost every Ryder Cup since 1995 has shown is that winning on away soil is one of the hardest tasks in the sport. Europe have done it once since the turn of the millennium, and that came after they had been completely outclassed for three sessions at Medinah.
So the dynamic completely changes for the American side next year; it is not so much about proving a point after Rome, it is about dealing with the pressure of being overwhelming favourites.
And given how consistent he has been, Schauffele is one the players Bradley will be relying on to make life as awful as possible for the Europeans.
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