Sergio Garcia is desperate to make his return to the Ryder Cup and the Spaniard has taken aim at the American players for their actions surrounding the pay debate.
Ryder Cup hero Sergio Garcia has fired the latest shot in the continuing row over player expenses at the elite golf competition. The Spanish ace, most prolific points-scorer in Ryder Cup history, is seeking a return to the European team after missing the success in Rome in 2023.
Garcia is set for a comeback to the DP World Tour in an effort he hopes will pay dividends when he is selected for next year’s event at Bethpage. When speaking to Bunkered Golf, he decided to take a jab at the US team over their new $400,000 participation fee.
To me personally, I think that’s unfortunate,” Garcia said. “It takes away everything that the Ryder Cup stands for in a way. I don’t think it’s ever been an issue for the European players. The Americans seem to be making an issue for a while and now they’re getting paid to play.”
He added, “Hopefully they’re happy about that but I don’t think it helps the Ryder Cup itself. We’re happy to play the Ryder Cup, it’s as simple as that. Our goal is to play the Ryder Cup and play as well as possible so Europe can win it.”
Garcia, a former Team Europe member, joined Rory McIlroy in expressing his concerns about the impact of players’ pay on the spirit of the cup. The five-time Ryder Cup winner stated: “I personally would pay for the privilege to play on the Ryder Cup, The two purest forms of competition in our game right now are the Ryder Cup and the Olympics, and it’s partly because of that, the purity of no money being involved.”, reports the Mirror US.
McIlroy added: “I don’t think any of the 24 players on either team needs that 400 grand. Every two years, there are 104 weeks and 103 weeks you can play golf and get paid. I think we would all welcome money if it didn’t change the dynamic but the money really would change the dynamic. That’s why I think everyone is like, let’s not do that
However, Tiger Woods has also aligned himself to the sentiments of his European counterparts in regards to what he had to say about Team USA’s players profiting. “I would like them to receive five and half million dollar each and I would like them to donate it all,” Woods said.
Perhaps, Woods went on explaining, what we really meant is that ‘We didn’t want to get paid.’ It seems we wanted to donate more money to nonprofit organizations. Then the media turned it on it’s head and said we want to be paid here and paid there. Well actually I suppose it has never really been about the money it has been about directing funds towards assisting our sport.
This decision has angered purists especially since the PGA of America seems to have caved in after Patrick Cantlay protested in Rome last year. Cantlay, bare cheeked, trying to convince them how the revenuer share should be split among the players. For the 2023 Ryder Cup, there would be $11.8m from a turnover in the region of $136.6m.