Tommy Fleetwood on Ryder Cup loss: ‘didn’t perform as bad as what the scoreline suggested’

Tommy Fleetwood was part of Europe’s historic 19-9 Ryder Cup loss last week, but the 30-year-old Englishman said the score wasn’t indicative of how his side played at Whistling Straits. 

“We sort of – we just – weren’t that far away, but we were far away in the end,” Fleetwood said after shooting 66 on Day 1 of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. “All the crucial moments sort of went the other way, and especially in my matches, as well. Obviously, I watched golf and I played it, and putts going the other way, you know, we missed a hole and it turns games on their heads. I felt like they did that so much better than us.

“We really as a team didn’t perform as bad as what the scoreline suggested, but still getting stumped really hurt us and it brought us very close together, and I think motivated us all a lot really to sit out and hopefully get it back.”

Full-field scores from the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship

Fleetwood notched just a single point for Europe last week, tying his both fourball match with Viktor Hovland against Justin Thomas and Patrick Cantlay and his Sunday singles match against Jordan Spieth. His only loss came with Hovland in a 3-and-1 defeat to Scottie Scheffler and Bryson DeChambeau in fourballs on Saturday. It was a far cry from his 4-1 week three years ago in Paris, where he went undefeated with Francesco Molinari as a partner and helped Europe win the cup.

But despite the lack of success this time around, Fleetwood still feels Europe put its best foot forward. 

“I thought the teams that we put out were great,” he said. “We’ve got 12 amazing players. We had good strength and depth. At the end of the day, of course, I would love to play, but also, I felt like I could do a good job in fourballs. I would have loved to have done better in fourballs, and I think the four sometimes teams that went out were right and they were really, really good.”

Along with the Ryder Cup, Fleetwood has had a forgettable year on the course. Last PGA Tour season, he had two top-10 finishes with his only top 5 coming at the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play and he missed the FedExCup playoffs. 

However, Fleetwood is aiming to soothe his golfing soul – as he put it on Twitter – in Scotland this week and he got off on the right foot Thursday, sitting T-6 after Round 1, despite traveling across the pond. 

“No, energy’s fine,” he said. “I feel good. I think last week was a very motivating week, and I enjoyed the energy that I got from my teammates and the Ryder Cup, in general, and everything that it brought.”