Suddenly, the future of British golf looks bright

Were you still up, as they used to say about Portillo in the 1997 election, for Hedwall? It was well past midnight on Sunday, the sort of hour when all good Spectator readers should be tucked up in bed — or when the really good ones are thinking about heading home — that Caroline Hedwall, a young Swedish golfer, made a birdie at the 18th hole of Colorado Golf Club that meant two unprecedented things.

For the first time on American soil, Europe could not lose the Solheim Cup, the women’s version of the Ryder Cup, and Hedwall had become the first player to win five matches out of five in the competition. Never mind the Ashes or the Lions tour, which were both against fairly weak Australian opposition, this was the outstanding team performance of the year.

Europe were never expected to win, let alone by a record 18-10. One American commentator was heard offering odds of 100-1 against his girls losing. You hope a few people took him up on it. The US had five members of the world’s top 20 to Europe’s three, they had the newly crowned British Open champion in Stacy Lewis, and they had never lost at home.

Europe had six rookies — half their team — one of whom, Charley Hull, was 17, but she got the final day’s singles matches off to the best start with a 5 and 4 thumping of Paula Creamer, one of America’s best players. Liselotte Neumann, the Europe captain, said she picked the young Englishwoman as a wild-card because she plays ‘fearless’ golf. She still plays like someone who thinks sport is meant to be fun.

Three moments stood out. The first was in a four-balls game on Saturday, when Hull stood on the tee of the par-three 17th with the match all square and the US only five feet from the pin.