Jersey City, New Jersey: The one-sided margin of the current Presidents Cup did not mean the event was broken, according to Jordan Spieth, as the Americans took a virtually unassailable 11-point lead heading into the 12 singles matches on Sunday.
The US lead the event 14-1/2 to 3-1/2 and are almost certain to record their 10th victory in 12 stagings of the event on Sunday, but Spieth believed the event was still relevant.
“I think home soil has played a big role this week,” Spieth said. “The pick-me-ups, the turnaround matches, the flipping, has had a lot to do with feeding off the crowds.
“When you go to away crowds, it’s that much harder to do it.
“Where are we, Royal Melbourne in two years?” he said of the next venue in Australia in 2019.
“As we know, the Aussies show up here in men’s clothes, women’s clothes and everything in between; they are going to be nuts there and they are going to really try and make a difference in that event.”
He was referring to the self-described ‘Fanatics’, a small group of mainly Australian fans who have not been hard to miss in their colourful garb.
“This is a fantastic event,” Spieth said.
“I think, if you ask the Internationals, they will say the same thing. And going forward, matches can flip either way, the same way they did this week.” Spieth was also asked whether the Europeans should be concerned at the US performance a year before the Ryder Cup in France.
“What’s really cool for us is, it’s not the dominance of this week, it’s the way this team has really come together, and we recognise that this is a very similar team to what we can see for the next 5 to 20 years, potentially,” he said.
“We’ve got a lot of really young guys on the team that are doing the right things to make their career last a long time and to be at the top level of the game.
“It’s more confidence for us than I think anything that they would be worried about.”
Only a one-up victory by India’s Anirban Lahiri and South Korea’s Kim Si-woo over Kevin Chappell and Charley Hoffman denied the United States a sweep of the afternoon four-balls to put celebrations at a breezy Liberty National on hold.
It also spared the Internationals of suffering the ultimate embarrassment of watching the trophy claimed on a Saturday for the first time.
“We’ve just come up against a juggernaut of an American team that has not put a foot wrong,” said International captain Nick Price. “They have had all the momentum and we’ve had nothing.”
