How does The Ryder Cup work?

The Ryder Cup is a tournament which takes place biennially over a total period of 3 days. There are two teams of 12 golfers that battle it out: Team USA and Team Europe. The match play competition was first created by Samuel Ryder, hence its name, and it was first played in 1927. The next Ryder Cup, in exactly one year's time, will be the 44th edition of the contest to be played.

When the competition was first established, the competitors were originally Great Britain and the USA. By 1979, the Cup had changed, allowing players from Continental Europe to join. Thus, the team became known as Team Europe.

The history of the Ryder Cup is long and storied. 

One of the more recent and infamous games (depending on what team's side you were on) happened in 2012 when Europe was suffering at the hands of the US who were in the lead with 10-4.

Ian Poulter for Europe had managed to hole 5 birdies on day 2, which saw him bring the score to 10-6 to the United States.

By day 3, however, things were to take an even bigger turn. A series of truly stunning singles saw the Europeans stride to victory with a 14 ½ - 13 ½ victory.

There are 2 teams: Team Europe and Team USA. Each of these teams has 12 players, making a total of 24 players taking part in the Cup. Each side has a team captain; both captains are chosen by both the PGA of America and the European Tour. It is then for each of the captains to decide on who they want to be their assistant captains.

The rest of the team is chosen via a mixture of performance according to European and World Points Lists and captain's picks, with 6 players coming from the points rankings, and 6 being chosen by the team's captains.

28 matches take place over the 3 days of the Ryder Cup.

There are 3 different types of match play:

• Foursomes

• Four balls

• Singles

Foursomes are when two golfers from each side play against two golfers from the other team, hitting tee shots. The team will hit alternate shots with each side using only one ball throughout play. The lowest score wins.

Similarly, four-ball matches are when two golfers for each side compete in a four-ball format; every Ryder Cup player will have his own ball and play with that same ball throughout this match. So, there are four balls (each player's own ball) on every hole.

The pair who has the lowest score wins that particular hole.

The last day of the Ryder Cup sees all players having the opportunity to get on the course in singles matches. The lowest score wins. If the scores are tied, half a point is awarded.

For each match played, one point is awarded to the winning team or player. In the event that a match finishes tied, a half-point is awarded to each side. These ties are known as halves. As there are a total of 28 matches in the entirety of the Cup, there are therefore 28 points for the taking.

The team who won the previous Ryder Cup will need at least 14 points to win the Ryder Cup this time around; the team that lost the Cup on the previous occasion need 14 1/2 points to win the Ryder Cup outright.

Although we've briefly outlined how the scoring works, the Ryder Cup scoring isn't as complicated as one might at first think.

Let's delve a bit deeper.

The Ryder Cup takes place over a period of 3 days. There is a strict daily schedule for each of those days. Days 1 and 2 will usually take place on a Friday and Saturday, with the 3rd and final - and arguably the most exciting - day taking place on Sunday.

Let's look into each day in a bit more detail.

On the starting day of the competition, there are a total of eight matches: four foursomes and four four-ball.

One of these formats is played in the morning, while the other is completed in the afternoon. It is the decision of the home team as to which order these formats are played.

On the second day of the Ryder Cup, as with the first day, there are four foursome matches and four four-ball matches. However, it is not the home captain who gets to decide the order of play; who plays in the morning and afternoon is in the same order as the previous day.

As this is the last day of doubles match play. Up until now, there have been four doubles sessions completed over 16 matches.

Day 3 is usually considered the most exciting and unpredictable day of the entire 3-day event. The day consists of a dozen singles matches. Both the Europe captain and the USA captain will turn in their orders of play without being aware of the order the opposing time is playing.

Unlike the first two days of play, every golfer in a team will play on day 3 as there are 12 singles matches and 12 golf players per team.

The team with the biggest number of points after the match wins the point for their team in the last of the Ryder Cup scoring. During the singles matches, the lowest score on each hole wins the hole.

The total amount of matches played is 28 over the 3-day competition.

Selecting the players for Ryder Cup matches has been changed and adapted over the years since the very first Ryder Cup match in 1927. When the competition first started, players were chosen by a selection committee that would oversee the addition of each player to either team. As the Cup progressed, the selection process was to become solely performance-based.

The current selection system works where a small sample of golfers are chosen by the team captain; these players are referred to as Captain's Picks or Wild Cards.

The Ryder Cup format states that neither team captain is to be made aware of the golfers the other team is going to play, as well as the order in which they are going to play. Match-ups are, therefore, random.

In terms of doubles sessions, both captains are able to decide which golfers to pair up, which will sit in and in what order the players will tee off.

The format for the Cup has changed to varying degrees over the years.

Below are some of those most notable changes to date:

Although the Team Great Britain was referred to as such until 1971, there were a number of golfers who played in the team who hailed from both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland as well as Jersey and Guernsey.

By 1973, however, the official name was amended to 'Great Britain and Ireland.' By 1979, that name had changed to 'Europe.'

• 1927 - United States 9–2

• 1929 - Great Britain 7–5

• 1931 - United States 9–3

• 1933 - Great Britain 6.5–5

• 1935 - United States 9–3

• 1937 - United States 8–4

• 1947 - United States 11–1

• 1949 - United States 7–5

• 1951 - United States 9.5–2.5

• 1953 - United States 6.5–5.5

• 1955 - United States 8–4

• 1957 - Great Britain 7.5–4.5

• 1959 - United States 8.5–3.5

• 1961 - United States 14.5–9.5

• 1963 - United States 23–9

• 1965 - United States 19.5–12.5

• 1967 - United States 23.5–8.5

• 1969 - United States 16–16

• 1971 - United States 18.5–13.5

• 1973 - United States 19–13

• 1975 - United States 21–11

• 1977 - United States 12.5 –7.5

• 1979 - United States 17–11

• 1981 - United States 18.5–9.5

• 1983 - United States 14.5–13.5

• 1985 - Europe 16.5–11.5

• 1987 - Europe 15–13

• 1989 - Europe 14–14

• 1991 - United States 14.5 –13.5

• 1993 - United States 15–13

• 1995 - Europe 14.5 –13.5

• 1997 - Europe 14.5 –13.5

• 1999 - United States 14.5 –13.5

• 2002 - Europe 15.5 –12.5

• 2004 - Europe 18.5 –9.5

• 2006 - Europe 18.5 – 9.5

• 2008 - United States 16.5 –11.5

• 2010 - Europe 14.5 –13.5

• 2012 - Europe 14.5 –13.5

• 2014 - Europe 16.5 –11.5

• 2016 - United States 17–11

• 2018 - Europe 17.5 –10.5

• 2021 - United States 19–9

There are some Ryder Cup traditions that both individual players and teams abide by.

Let's look at a few of them:

Say a player gets injured and is unable to play his singles match; what's going to happen? In the event that a player is unable to continue, the opposing captain will then select one of his players to drop out, thus creating an equal number of players. This player and the injured party are matched up, with the match recorded as half.

However, prior to the start of a match, both the Europe and the United States captains are required to name the player they will drop if injury or illness forces a member of the opposing team to discontinue play. Both these names are placed in a respective envelope, which is why these conditions are referred to as the 'Envelope Rule.'

Another tradition in the Ryder Cup is teams paying tribute to those golfers who have recently passed away, which has been seen numerous times. One of the most notable - and poignant - occurred in 2012 when the Europe captain Olazábal dedicated his team's Ryder Cup win to fellow Spaniard Seve Ballesteros, who had died of brain cancer, aged 54, 6 years previously. In his memory, the Europe team wore blue and white attire on the last day of the tournament, in a nod to Ballesteros's Sunday colours.

It's not just the Ryder Cup matches that are a huge spectacle; there's a huge opening ceremony before each match, as well as a celebrity golf match which has taken place before the Ryder Cup since 2012. Some of the celebrities who have taken part have included Oscar-nominated actor Bill Murray, the most decorated Olympian of all time, Michael Phelps, and Grammy award-winning singer Justin Timberlake.

The Solheim Cup is the women's equivalent to the Ryder Cup. Named after the Norwegian-American golf club producer Karsten Solheim, similar to the Ryder Cup, the Solheim Cup takes place every two years and is contested by two teams; Europe and the United States.

The first Cup match was held in 1990 and continued to take place during even-numbered years, which would alternate with the men's equivalent. Following the 9/11 attacks in New York, the Solheim was moved to 2002, which meant the Cup was played in the same year as the Ryder Cup.

There was a second upheaval to the Cup in 2022 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns. The next Solheim Cup is due to take place in 2024 after returning to even-numbered years.

Now we know how the tournament works, what it entails and how that not-as-complicated-as-you-might-think Ryder Cup scoring works, below we've also outlined some of the main points to take away with you from this in-depth analysis of what is, arguably, the best golfing competition on earth.

• The Ryder Cup is a hugely popular event in the golfing calendar and is watched by millions of television viewers across the world. Tickets are extremely difficult to come by, but those that are quick can join tens of thousands of fellow spectators for the 3-day event.

• The Cup is battled for by two teams: Europe and the United States. 28 matches are played over the event, with a point being granted to whoever wins each one. In the event of a tie, a half-point is awarded to each side.

• During Days 1 and 2 of the Cup, both four-ball and foursomes formats are played; by Day 3, the game turns to single matches, with the winners being announced that day.

• To date, Europe has conquered 11 out of 20 games, with 1 tie. The Americans have won 8, with only 2 of those wins being completed 'away'.

• The female equivalent of the Ryder Cup is known as the Solheim Cup and was first established in 1990, making it a newer event than its counterpart.

The Ryder Cup is unique in that the winning team do not receive any prize money for their successes. There is, however, an official Ryder Cup trophy; it's 17 inches tall, 9 inches thick and weighs approximately 4 pounds. It was designed to resemble the British golfer Abe Mitchell.

For taking part, the PGA of America is said to give each member of Team USA $200,000 toward charity, whereas Team Europe receive gifts from the captain.

To date, there have been six holes-in-one throughout Ryder Cup history. The first was by Peter Bulter in Muirfield in East Lothian, Scotland, back in 1973. However, Bulter has the unenviable title of being the only hole-in-one scorer not to win the Ryder Cup.

2006 saw the most recent holes-in-one, one of which was played by Paul Casey and the other by Scott Verplank.

At Glenmuir, we do men's and ladies' fashion like no other. In fact, we are the number one choice among Team Europe, with the European Ryder Cup team first wearing our unique designs at the 1987 Ryder Cup in the United States.

You can also show your colours with the Official Glenmuir 2023 Ryder Cup men's and ladies' collections.

Why not check out our wide selection of designs, sizes and fabrics so you can look your very best on the course? We have everything from clothes to accessories and gifts that every golf fan is sure to love.

We hope this definitive guide to the Ryder Cup has helped you understand more about the sometimes complex world of the Ryder Cup.

But, while the rules and regulations of the competition are important, perhaps what is more important is the sheer love, not just the nation; the world has for this unique tournament. But, no one has no respect for this almost century-old competition like those who get the opportunity to be a part of it.

Taking part in the Ryder Cup isn't about the money - which is a very good thing, as there isn't a prize pot.

What is it about, however, is the glory, the pride and the sheer honour of taking part in a truly momentous event in the golfing calendar. Getting the opportunity for your name to go down in the history books, hopefully for the right reasons, must be a feeling like no other.

And, as we nearly approach the 100th anniversary of the first-ever Ryder Cup game, it's clear the competition has seen some huge changes, many for the better.

But what's for certain, is that this monumental biennial clash of the golfing greats is not going anywhere, anytime soon.

And, with that, may the friendly(ish) rivalry between Team Europe and Team USA long continue.