DUBLIN – The Ryder Cup can inflame passion, as it did at Hazeltine in 2016, when Patrick Reed and Rory McIlroy screamed in exultation over every made putt, and fans verbally abused McIlroy in a sometimes-vulgar display of over-the-top patriotic fervor.
With the 2025 Ryder Cup set to start on Friday at Bethpage Black, a few prominent members of the Dublin golf community reflected on their favorite golfing sons, and the Irish perspective on one of the few competitions in the world that specifically pits Europe and the United States.
Eric Byrne, assistant club pro at Elm Park Golf Club in Dublin, doesn’t foresee the Irish members of the European team behaving the way Reed did.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “I think it would be more of what we would call a `gentle slagging.’ A bit of back-and-forth, all right, but I don’t think it would get as personal.”
The European team features two Irish players. Shane Lowry grew up in Clara, which is about an hour’s drive from Dublin. Rory McIlroy is from Northern Ireland and competes for Ireland in the Olympics.
Lowry spends much of his time in the United States but maintains a membership at Castle Golf Club in Dublin. McIlroy is known to play occasionally in Dublin, and Peter Morgan, the head pro at Elm Park Golf and Sports Club, is friends with McIlroy’s caddie, Harry Diamond.
On Thursday in Dublin, Philip Hollowed, the golf and facilities manager at Castle Golf Club, stood with his back to the course’s improbably green first hole and rhapsodized about Ireland’s place on golf’s world stage.
“We’re always very enthusiastic about any Irish representation on the Ryder Cup team,” he said. “In the last 15 or 20 years, we seem to have solidified our place with the likes of Rory, and Padraig Harrington, Darren Clarke, and, of course, Shane.
