Analysis | Ryder Cup an opportunity missed for French golf

Tiger Woods of the US arrives in a buggy to start a practice round for the Ryder Cup at Le Golf National
in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, outside Paris

It remains, on the eve of the Ryder Cup outside Paris, the defining image of French golf: Jean Van de Velde losing the British Open in excruciating fashion in 1999, peeling off his socks and shoes to fish his ball out of the silty creek in a final- hole meltdown at Carnoustie.

“Oh, Jean, Jean, Jean …,” lamented BBC commentator Peter Alliss, hunting for words to describe the brain-freeze that destroyed the Frenchman’s three-shot lead. “Would somebody kindly go and stop him? Give him a large brandy and mop him down.”

This week’s clash between Europe and the United States at Le Golf National offered the possibility of a reset for French golf. Imagine how Gallic hearts would have soared, how many kids from Paris and beyond might have been lured off soccer fields and onto greens, had a hometown hero been around to sink the winning putt on Sunday, to cries of “Vive L’Europe!” and “Vive la France!”

Opportunity missed. Victor Dubuisson, the last Frenchman (and just third ever) to play in a Ryder Cup, in Europe’s most recent victory in 2014, isn’t here, laid low by an injury to his left inner ear. Despite their intimate knowledge of Le Golf National’s Albatross course, France’s highest-ranked players, Alexander Levy (91) and Michael Lorenzo-Vera (99), didn’t loom large on the radar of Europe team captain Thomas Bjorn. This 42nd Ryder Cup will be the first without a player from the home nation.

Given their multitude of other strengths, their mastery of culinary arts and of fine living, the eternal romance of Paris and the heartache of Edith Piaf, perhaps it’s only fair that the French don’t also have a top golfer. Certainly, the absence of a French Tiger Woods isn’t really felt outside golfing circles. The nation is still buzzing from its soccer team’s victory at the World Cup in July . Ask the schoolkids who have been touring Le Golf National during practice this week and most reply that, given the choice, they would rather follow in the footsteps of Kylian Mbappe, France’s 19-year-old soccer star , than the far wealthier and globally more famous Woods.

Still, French organizers of only the second Ryder Cup to be held in continental Europe see this week’s tournament as a potential big step toward a greater footprint for golf in France, where it trails behind soccer, tennis, horse riding, judo, basketball and handball in numbers of card-carrying players.

Pascal Grizot, the golf-loving businessman who has overseen tournament preparations as president of the 2018 Ryder Cup committee, notes that 44 percent of tickets were bought by French spectators, who snapped up their allocation in less than two hours. The French golf federation’s 410,000 signed-up members also helped cover tournament costs, each chipping in 3 euros (about USD3.50) per year.

“It’s going to be an extraordinary success,” Grizot said. “We’ll be speaking about golf like never before in France. Afterward, we’ll have to see what heritage it leaves, but I’m not worried.” John Leicester, Saint-Quentin-En-Yvelines, AP