The Presidents Cup format begins with a match play. Now, this is a round that can turn out to be tricky. While at a point in time, it is okay to let your guard down, and believe that you have the hole in your control, the next moment you’re on the green, ten feet left for birdie.
The opponent is watching you from a green-side bunker. The worst that could happen is your opponent will end up scoring a par, leaving a tie. But is that the case? After the Thursday round at the Royal Montreal, it looks like Sahith Theegala just has the perfect explanation for the match-play format.
Sahith Theegala calls match play a funny thing
On Thursday, Sahith Theegala was paired with Collin Morikawa from the US Team. They ended up defeating International Team’s Min Woo Lee and Adam Scott by 1 up. At the post-round presser in Royal Montreal, he said, “Match play is a funny thing. There’s always some Mongolians and things go the ways that you don’t think it would go.” He then went on to add that their round was an intense one indeed. But the best part of it was undoubtedly how they finished it.
Team USA led with a 5-0 score after the first round, that’s how excellently they had played. When asked to clarify what he meant by Mongolians by Shane Ryan, Theegala replied that he did not know when he originated the term, in front of Xander Schauffele, Keegan Bradley, and Scottie Scheffler.
“I guess it’s just when your opponents are in a better place than you on the hole and you do something cool like make a long putt. It looks like your opponents were going to win the hole when you hit the approach shots in, but you make the long putt and they miss the short putt, and all of a sudden looking like you’re losing the hole to win the hole,” added Theegala.
