Little white balls

Never been sporty in the participation sense of the word but there's nothing better lying on the sofa watching the telly, particularly when it's watching the US get humped. To coin a phrase "Ahhhwesome!" I usually only watch the closing holes of a major championship when it's on the box but the Ryder Cup is different. It's personal. You've got to support your local boys and for me that's Darren Clarke from Norn Iron, then the Irish guys and so on.

There's something about US professional Sport Stars that just grates with me, from the Superbowl winners declaring themselves as "World Champions" to the Olympic Basketball "Dream Team" throwing hissy fits when they get hammered to the shennigans a few years ago when the US Ryder Cup team and crowd showed complete and utter contempt for the opposition by running all over the place a whooping and a hollering while the match was still being played, very poor.

My dislike of the US sporting crowd stems from the LA Olympics of 1984 when the constant chants of USA went through me like a knife. Britain is often criticised for not showing enough support and pride in it's own achievements but if this is the cost of it I'll gladly stick to a little rise of the eyebrow and shake of the head when it all goes belly up and a nice smile and feeling of pride and satisfaction when it goes well.

The recently finished Olympics showed signs that our commentators have forgotten that they are there to report and not involve themselves in jingoistic nonsense (Brendan Foster's outburst during the women's Marathon was shameful). This brought nothing but embarrassment and shame on Britain. The great commentators like Dan Maskell (Tennis), Arnott (Cricket), Peter Alliss (Golf) etc never needed to debase their job with such outbursts.

And so to the Ryder Cup where the ridiculous shouting continues "Ahhhwesome", "Your the man" and the worst of all "In the hole" which seems to be shouted at every shot whether it be a final putt or the tee shot on a Par 5. The European Team and their Captain, Bernard Langer, are doing themselves proud and long may it continue. The US have the best Golfers but the Ryder Cup has always been about the team, something which the US seem to need to relearn whenever a collection of individual millionaire sport stars are brought together to represent their country. Hopefully the Europeans can go on to display their graciousness in victory or defeat and the US crowd and team can show respect to the opposition whether they win or not.

Category:

• Sport
• Golf