Tom McKibbin suffered his first defeat of the week but it didn’t matter as Great Britain & Ireland completed an impressive 17-8 victory in the 2025 Team Cup at Abu Dhabi Golf Resort.
McKibbin was beaten on the 18th by Matteo Manassero in the Sunday singles but the destination of the trophy was already set for GB&I who had secured the required thirteen points after Laurie Canter’s comfortable win before Tommy Fleetwood sealed the victory with a 3&1 win over Matthieu Pavon.
Ryder Cup star Fleetwood, who won all four of his points across the week to embellish his formidable record in team events, said: “It obviously feels great, what an unbelievable group of lads we had this week and an unbelievable captain so just a pleasure to be a part of it.
“Everybody just played so well. I always find it very motivating and inspiring being around the lads in a team environment, you want to get best out of yourself. Happy that we got it done this time and sure we’ll enjoy it later.”
Tyrrell Hatton and Rose quickly made it 15-4 and GB&I were up in all but one of the matches remaining on the course at Abu Dhabi Golf Resort.
Continental Europe Captain Francesco Molinari earned a half-point as his side battled creditably to take three points from the final four matches but the week belonged to Rose’s men.
GB&I skipper Rose hailed his side’s relentless attitude heading into the Sunday singles and was delighted to get the job done early.
“The way they played was first class. We had one clear message which was to get on the front foot, to try to be relentless, to play wave after wave.
“Playing on a big lead, everybody felt like we could get the job done but just to focus on individual and personal pride. The leaderboard early in the round was astonishing, really.
“Every credit to Continental Europe and Francesco himself, you saw that up-and-down he had on 18 and the team as a whole fought to the very end and clawed back a few points.
“The whole matches were played in such a great spirit but my team definitely holed the right putts at the right time and won most of those key matches.”
Danish star Niklas Norgaard secured the first point of the day for Molinari’s men with a 3&2 win over Matthew Jordan while Paul Waring capped off a fine performance with a 4&3 win over Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen.
Continental Europe went on a mini flurry with 1UP wins for Antoine Rozner and Manassero while Molinari and Rasmus Hojgaard shared the spoils in their singles ties.
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