
[Source: Reuters]
With their performances at the FedEx St. Jude Championship on Sunday, England’s Justin Rose and Tommy Fleetwood clinched spots on Team Europe for the Ryder Cup next month against the United States.
Rose, who won the $20 million tournament in Memphis in a playoff, and Fleetwood, who struggled down the stretch to finish one shot off the pace, earned enough points to join Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlroy as automatic qualifiers for the competition on Sept. 26-28 at Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, N.Y.
Team Europe captain Luke Donald is required to select the top six players in the Europe Team Rankings when the British Masters concludes on Aug. 24. Donald gets to choose the other six golfers to round out his team, which will defend the Cup it won in 2023 in Italy.
“Amazing to have both of these guys back on the Team,” Donald wrote on X above a Ryder Cup Europe post on Rose and Fleetwood making the team. “They bring so much both on and off the course. Let’s Go!”
Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre, England’s Tyrrell Hatton and Austria’s Sepp Straka hold fourth through sixth place heading into this week’s play.
MacIntyre will be part of the BMW Championship field at Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Md. Straka, however, withdrew from the $20 million tournament on Monday for family reasons. Hatton will be playing the LIV Tour event in Indianapolis, where he can not collect points.
Ireland’s Shane Lowry, Denmark’s Rasmus Hojgaard and Sweden’s Ludvig Aberg are within striking range of being automatic qualifiers.
Lowry trails Straka for sixth by just 21.16 points. As long as Lowry completes the BMW Championship this weekend, he’ll earn enough points to climb past Hatton and Straka. Competitors at the BMW Championship receive 1.5 points for each $1,000 they earn.
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