Nothing ladylike about this transatlantic battle

GOLF 2009 SOLHEIM CUP: DERBY DAYS:Something about this biennial match has consistently brought the bad blood out in the players and brought the crowds out in huge numbers

THE RYDER Cup has often struggled to get the public’s juices flowing – having to place its trust more in the profile of the competitors than on any perceived transatlantic rivalry.

Not so the women’s equivalent.

The professional golfers of America’s LPGA and Europe’s LET have more than taken to the idea of squaring up to their opponents in more than just name. The enmity is, perhaps, surprising considering the Solheim Cup is less than 20 years in existence, in comparison with the more than 80 years of Ryder Cup action.

But something about this biennial match has consistently brought the bad blood out in the players and brought the crowds out in huge numbers – in the last edition, 33,200 attended on the Saturday and 36,100 on the Sunday, in Halmstad, Sweden.

A year after Justin Leonard’s 45-foot birdie putt caused an invasion of the 17th green by celebrating team-mates in 1999 – the biggest controversy in the men’s team competition – the USA stood again accused of being bad sports after Annika Sorenstam was forced to retake a shot after chipping-in for birdie in the Solheim Cup.

After the Swede holed a superb 25-footer at the 13th hole, Kelly Robbins realised her ball was a few feet farther from the hole. Sorenstam had unwittingly played out of turn. The Americans could order the shot retaken, and US captain Pat Bradley so ordered. This time, a visibly shaken and upset Sorenstam missed.

“Unsporting” was the verdict of England’s Laura Davies, who lines up for the 11th edition of the competition this week and is the only player to appear in every Solheim Cup.

“Within the rules” protested Bradley, whose captaincy got off to a shaky start the previous year when she earned the nickname the “Boston Strangler” by grabbing Dale Eggeling’s caddie by the collar and accusing him of coughing during her backswing.

“It is just really sad when you have tournaments like this,” Sorenstam said after the fourball, which America won 2 and 1. “It is sad to see that the ugly part of them (Americans) came out, because both Pat (Hurst) and Kelly are the nicest they have. And it is just sad to see that – that they don’t even have sportsmanship.”

While the incident overshadowed the quality on show, it provided a shot in the arm in terms of profile, though Europe had already lost their claim to the moral high ground when, at the 1998 meeting, a dummy, known as “Dottie”, served as a punchbag for the European team.

Dottie Pepper led the Americans to victory that year at Muirfield Village; the low esteem in which the two-time major winner was held by the European team originated from an incident at the 1994 Solheim Cup, when Pepper celebrated a missed putt by Davies in a close match by shouting: “Yes!”

And in golf, worse than a breach of etiquette on the course is a refusal to apologise afterwards.

When asked about the criticism of her celebration, Pepper – who once apparently suggested that had it not been for golf the European players would be stacking supermarket shelves – replied: “I really don’t care.”

Ironically, though, if anyone uses a Pepper punchbag this week, it’ll be the Americans.

At the Halmstad event two years ago, she caused a furore by calling the American team “Choking freaking dogs” live on the Golf Channel. This time, at least, she was quick to apologise.

And, as if all those engaging bad manners and poor etiquette weren’t enough to turn the public off the other team and on to the biggest event in women’s professional golf, there came the honesty of Sweden’s Catrin Nilsmark.

Eleven years after sinking the winning putt in Europe’s first victory over the United States, Nilsmark was captain for the 2003 event held in her native country. A year before the event, she posted a scouting report of the US team on a website, which was, not surprisingly, passed to the American players concerned.

Nilsmark said she admired Michele Redman for hanging tough despite having “absolutely no talent”, Cristie Kerr was a “little brat”, Laura Diaz “cocky” and suggested Meg Mallon was too old.

It’s unlikely even Colin Montgomerie – the captain of the European Ryder Cup team – would oblige with such a similarly honest critique of the likely American players for next year’s Celtic Manor event.

It all makes the Ryder Cup look positively pale and pally in comparison.