Wasn't the Solheim Cup just wonderful entertainment at the weekend? It had slow burn drama, with Europe coming back from 4-0 down to the USA after the first session on the Friday morning. Then it had intense drama on the final day, with the teams going into the last series of matches level and swings of fortune with good and poor shots as the pressure grew towards the end. There were great individual stories with Spaniard Carlota Ciganda, playing in her home country, scoring the most points of the 24 players and recording the only perfect performance with 4 wins in her 4 matches.
I don't watch that much women's sport. I used to watch the tennis a lot but when I do now it is almost always the men. This isn't sexism, it's availability of time to watch sport when there is so much good live televised action available. I'm a bloke, so I watch the men partly because I know more about the players and the teams so an unexpected result is, well, unexpected. If you haven't got a clue about the background to what you are watching then it doesn't mean as much to you.
And inevitably in most sports the best men represent the elite level. That could change over time, but probably only on a theoretical, "pound for pound" basis. According to the Bleacher report Sugar Ray Robinson was the best ever boxer in the world on a pound for pound basis*. He boxed initially at welterweight, moving up to middleweight and eventually light heavyweight by the end of his career. The Bleacher Report puts heavyweight Muhammad Ali at 4 on their list, but we know who would have won on most occasions if they could have got in the ring together with both at their peak.
I watch the occasional boxing match but generally only a world heavyweight bout. It's the elite level, isn't it?
I have started to watch quite a bit of women's football, though only the international matches. I remember my then teenage sons guffawing in the 1990s when I said I thought women's football would become a big spectator sport. I just didn't see why it wouldn't. It's a team game so players can adopt positions that suit their balance of speed and strength. Physical size and strength alone is far from everything, technique and teamwork matters. But there is a reason that men and women don't compete together in most sports: it wouldn't be a fair competition. And therein lies the crux of the transgender issue in sport. There is a reason you don't see trans men attempting to compete in men's events. On that basis the women can never be as "good" (in the round) as the men on a head to head basis.
But there is no reason why women competing with women can't make just as good - and sometimes better - entertainment than watching the men. The Solheim Cup was indeed superb, with the tight finish that made for uncertainty of outcome and excitement to the end.
So now I'll really upset some of the ladies and say - it was a superb starter for the main course of the Ryder Cup this week. Indeed, many have said that the Solheim and Ryder Cups being played in consecutive weeks should become the plan (it last happened that way in 2002). It seems like a good idea to me.
We'll both be watching the Ryder Cup - it's Mrs H's favourite sporting competition bar none. It may or may not prove as riveting as the Solheim Cup - that depends how the tournament unfolds. But the brave effort of Europe's Ladies should give encouragement to the men.
On world rankings alone the USA would be strong favourites. The average world ranking of their 12 man team is 13 to Europe's 29. The USA team has the same core as their team that beat Europe comfortably two years ago. Ah, but. That was at home, in the USA. It's our turn to host and it's in Rome. The USA hasn't won in Europe in their last 6 attempts, since 1993. They tend not to travel as well, or compete as strongly for each other, though last time out they did seem more of a "team". (A strange concept in what is essentially an individual sport, I know, but team matchplay does feel very much like a team event).
When you look at those world rankings, it's the "tail" in Europe's team that affects the numbers. The lowest four ranked players in the Europe squad are at 36, 55, 80 and 81 in the world rankings compared with the USA's supposedly weakest four at 19, 20, 24 and 25.
The median ranking isn't very different for the two teams: 6 of USA's players have a world ranking above 11, 6 below. For Europe the median is 15.
The rankings reflect performance over a two year period, though with a front end weighting to more recent performances. So they don't fully reflect current form. Or take account of a golfer improving rapidly. Europe's theoretically next weakest golfer, with a world ranking of 80, is the Swede Ludvig Aberg, who only turned professional in June. In that time he has recorded several top 10 finishes and has already won one tournament, the Omega European Masters at the beginning of September.
And, as the Solheim Cup showed, world rankings aren't a predictor of outcomes in head to head matches. Europe's highest rated player, Celine Boutier, 3rd in the world when the teams were picked, lost all three of her matches, including her singles match to Angel Yin, ranked 32nd. Meanwhile Caroline Hedwall, ranked 120th, beat Ally Ewing ranked 33rd to record a vital win late in the singles and Emily Kristine Pederson, ranked 114th, got 2.5 points out of a possible 4 in her matches.
The men know this of course. One remembers several European golfers beating Tiger Woods, for example and famously Welshman Philip Price beating Phil Mickelson, 117 places above him at number 2 in the world rankings at the time, in his only Ryder Cup appearance in 2002. "Tell them who I beat" he shouted to Lee Westwood at the post event dinner and who could blame him?
So it's all to play for. Go Europe! I can hardly wait.
PS Here are Europe's ladies with the Solheim cup, having retained it as holders after their 14 -14 tie. The (American) Ladies Professional Golf Association (LGPA) rather embarrassingly said on their website that Europe defeated team USA....still it must have felt like a defeat to them I suppose. The men need to win this week, a tie would see USA retain the trophy.
* https://bleacherreport.com/articles/1436191-the-top-50-pound-for-pound-boxers-of-all-time
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