Golf is an individual game - legacies are built on personal success

Now that the Ryder Cup is over, golf returns to normal.

Of the 19 flags that rippled in a cool breeze on Tuesday morning at The Grove, none was a blue banner with 13 gold stars. They were from Northern Ireland and South Africa, Canada and Australia, the United States and England.

Chad Campbell, Brett Wetterich and Jim Furyk walked down the first fairway as friends, but not teammates. Phil Mickelson has gone back on vacation, if he ever left. No one will pick up a ball from anywhere but the bottom of the cup.

Everyone is responsible for his own golf. Only one player gets the trophy.

The only winning streak anyone is talking about involves Tiger Woods, the best in the world when he's playing for himself. While his streak ended two weeks ago at the World Match Play Championship about 30 miles down the M25 at Wentworth, a victory in the American Express Championship would be his sixth in a row at US PGA Tour events.

Sure, Woods successfully defending his title at this World Golf Championship would emphasise that Americans only care more about their own achievements than winning a 17-inch (43-centimetre) golf trophy named after an English seed merchant. But that's how it should be.

Golf is an individual game. Legacies are built on personal success, not team play that happens one week out of the year. Think of the players who are linked with their performance in team events, and you'll find guys who have never won a major, some who have never won many tournaments at all. Colin Montgomerie. Sergio Garcia. Chris DiMarco.

No one has won more points for Europe than Nick Faldo, but that's only a postscript on the resume of a six-time major champion who won back-to-back at the Masters and once made 18 pars in his final round to win the British Open.