The 24th Ryder Cup Matches were held 18–20 September 1981 at the

Walton Heath Golf Club Walton Heath Golf Club is a golf club in England, near Walton-on-the-Hill in Surrey, southwest of London. Founded in 1903, the club comprises two 18-hole golf courses, both of which are well known for having heather covering many of the areas o ...

Walton-on-the-Hill Walton-on-the-Hill, Surrey, is a village in England midway between the market towns of Reigate and Epsom. The village is a dispersed cluster on the North Downs centred less than one mile inside of the M25 motorway. The village hosts the Wa ...

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, southwest of

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. The United States team won the competition by a score of 18 to 9 points. It was the largest margin of defeat for a European team (since 1979) at the Ryder Cup until

2021 File:2021 collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: the James Webb Space Telescope was launched in 2021; Protesters in Yangon, Myanmar following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, coup d'état; A civil demonstration against the October–November 2021 ...

. It is also the largest margin of defeat for the host team on European soil. Seve Ballesteros was not selected for the European team after an ongoing dispute with the

European Tour The European Tour (currently known as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons), legally the PGA European Tour is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European Senior Tour (for players aged fi ...

concerning appearance money.

Tony Jacklin Anthony Jacklin CBE (born 7 July 1944) is a retired English golfer. He was the most successful British player of his generation, winning two major championships, the 1969 Open Championship and the 1970 U.S. Open. He was also Ryder Cup captai ...

was also left off the team. It was the sixth and final Ryder Cup for Jack Nicklaus as a competitor and he won all four of his matches. He had failed to make the team for the first time in 1979.

Bernhard Langer Bernhard Langer (; born 27 August 1957) is a German professional golfer. He is a two-time Masters champion and was one of the world's leading golfers throughout the 1980s and 1990s. In 1986, he became the sport's first official number one ran ...

made his Ryder Cup debut in 1981 and was 1–2 in pairs and halved his singles match.

Format

The Ryder Cup is a

match play Match play is a scoring system for golf in which a player, or team, earns a point for each hole in which they have bested their opponents; as opposed to stroke play, in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 h ...

event, with each match worth one point. The competition format was adjusted slightly from the 1979 event, with the order of play swapped on the first two days and the third day singles matches held in a single session: *Day 1 — 4 foursome (alternate shot) matches in a morning session and 4 four-ball (better ball) matches in an afternoon session *Day 2 — 4 four-ball matches in a morning session and 4 foursome matches in an afternoon session *Day 3 — 12 singles matches With a total of 28 points, 14 points were required to win the Cup. All matches were played to a maximum of 18 holes.

Teams

Ten of the European team were selected using a points list based on money earned in

Events. The final event was the

Benson & Hedges International Open The Benson & Hedges International Open was a men's professional golf tournament which was played in England. It was founded in 1971 and for its first five years it was called the Benson & Hedges Festival of Golf. It was sponsored by Benson & Hedge ...

which finished on 24 August. Eamonn Darcy finished in a tie for second place in this tournament, lifting him from 12th to 7th in the list and relegating Mark James to 11th place. The two remaining places were chosen immediately after the Benson & Hedges International by a selection committee consisting of John Jacobs (the captain),

Neil Coles Neil Chapman Coles, MBE (born 26 September 1934) is an English professional golfer. Coles had a successful career in European golf, winning 29 important tournaments between 1956 and 1982. After reaching 50, he won a further 14 important Seniors ...

and Bernhard Langer. They chose Mark James and Peter Oosterhuis, who was playing on the

PGA Tour The PGA Tour (stylized in all capital letters as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in the United States and North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also ...

and had recently won the Canadian Open. Players chosen by the selection committee are shown in yellow. 11 of the American team were selected from a points list. Qualification based on the points list finished after the

Western Open The Western Open was a professional golf tournament in the United States, for most of its history an event on the PGA Tour. The tournament's founding in 1899 actually pre-dated the start of the Tour, which is generally dated from 1916, the ye ...

on July 5. Bill Rogers earned his place by finishing 5th in this final event, while Jack Nicklaus only assured his place in the team after a final round 69 and a tie for 7th place. The final place in the team was allocated to the winner of the 1981 PGA Championship (which finished on August 9), provided he was not in the top 11, in which case the 12th player in the points list would qualify (

Howard Twitty Howard Allen Twitty (born January 15, 1949) is an American professional golfer who played on the PGA Tour in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s; and played on the Champions Tour from 1999 until 2007. Twitty was born in Phoenix, Arizona. He graduated fro ...

). With his victory in the PGA Championship, Larry Nelson gained the last slot. Nelson had finished 17th in the points list. Nelson qualified by virtue of winning the 1981 PGA Championship.

Friday's matches

''18 September 1981''

Morning foursomes

Afternoon four-ball

Saturday's matches

''19 September 1981''

Morning four-ball

Afternoon foursomes

Sunday's singles matches

''20 September 1981''

Individual player records

Each entry refers to the win–loss–half record of the player. Source:

Europe

United States

Video

2012 Ryder Cup
Ryder Cup Flashback: 1981
1981 Ryder Cup
British broadcast

References

* *

External links

PGA of America: 1981 Ryder CupWalton Heath Golf Club: 1981 Ryder Cup
{{coord, 51.278, -0.244, type:event, display=title Ryder Cup Golf tournaments in England Sport in Surrey Ryder Cup Ryder Cup Ryder Cup