Winner’s bag: Shane Lowry, The Open Championship

He keeps coming close. That means he’s playing well. It also means something is off just enough, over and over, to keep him from holding the trophy.

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MELBOURNE, Australia – Hindsight is always 20/20. As Ernie Els and his International team pick apart how they were once again unable to thwart a U.S. juggernaut that improved to 11-1-1 in the Presidents Cup they will of course mull over a multitude of moments. Sometimes it is a useless exercise. You can second guess every decision you made and go down a very deep rabbit hole. But sometimes it can be cathartic and you can ensure growth in the future. The dissection of the change of culture amongst the team will later, but there is enough to suggest they are on the right track. While every loss is critical in the final wash up, right now let’s look at the moments on the golf course that really hurt the International cause as they seemingly could have been flipped the other way. Related: Final scoring | Playing for Tiger, the U.S. refuses to lose | Day 4 Singles match recaps FRIDAY FOURSOMES Having won the opening Thursday Four-Ball session 4-1, Els and his team were in great shape heading to the second day. But they were also somewhat cautious knowing they hadn’t won a Foursomes session since 2005. On Friday, that seemed set to change… and in a big way. The Internationals were up in all five matches on the back nine and the projected score read 9-1. But projections are just that. When the U.S. side was ripe to be stomped on the neck, the Internationals failed to do so. First Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele provided 18th hole heroics to beat Joaquin Niemann and Adam Hadwin 1 up before Tiger Woods and Justin Thomas did exactly the same over Hideki Matsuyama and Byeong Hun An. On the 18th tee of both matches, Els would have been hoping for a full point but probably would have settled for a halve. Instead, his team walked away with nothing. In the final match of the session, Sungjae Im and Cameron Smith were 2 up with three holes to play, but lost the 16th and 17th holes and had to settle for a half. In the end, the session ended 2.5-2.5 to push the score to 6.5-3.5, not the worst result but certainly not 9-1. “I wouldn’t say we totally lost momentum, but it was, to me, I felt it was a bit of a blow,â€� Els said post-mortem. “The team didn’t react in that way which I was really proud of, but me as captain, and I didn’t reveal it to them, but I felt we had them right in the headlock, and we didn’t quite finish it off on that particular time. “There’s not many times when you get a team like that under the pump like that. It was great, but it could have been unbelievable. It could have been a knockout blow. “That was probably the difference. We had so much momentum. We had so much going for us… that’s 2.5 points, and where we are, we are 1.5 points shy. So absolutely, that was something.â€� SATURDAY FOUR-BALL Once again the Internationals won the Four-Ball session, but a critical missed chance at a full point in the anchor match between Byeong Hun An/Adam Scott and Tony Finau/Matt Kuchar was another twist of a knife in an open wound. Sporting a 1 up lead coming down the final hole, Scott hit his approach to nine-feet. Finau was slightly better at seven-feet. If Scott made the putt it would have secured the win. But he watched it slide by the edge and then Finau took the gift and ran with it. Instead of 3-1 it was 2.5-1.5 and instead of 9.5-4.5 it was 9-5. SATURDAY FOURSOMES The Internationals came out of a 3-1 session loss actually feeling positive after some incredible fighting qualities were shown. Marc Leishman and Abraham Ancer were unbelievable in earning a half after sitting 5 down though 10 holes to Justin Thomas and Rickie Fowler. Joaquin Niemann and Byeong Hun An also overcame a late two-hole deficit to secure a half point and also ensure a lead heading to singles. But the reality is both matches that were lost had leads at one point and An was given a chance to win a full point from just outside six-feet on the final hole. The putt came up short and low leaving the final tally at 10-8 heading to singles instead of 10.5-7.5. SUNDAY SINGLES Hideki Matsuyama was for a long time the only bright star during a tough start to the singles session. While Abraham Ancer was fighting hard but never leading against Tiger Woods ahead of him and C.T. Pan and Haotong Li were getting dominated behind him against Patrick Reed and Dustin Johnson respectively, Matsuyama had bounced out to a 4 up lead through 10 holes over Tony Finau. It was a point the Internationals had basically banked as they scrambled to find other places on the course to try to flip the red tidal wave off the boards. But Finau was having none of it. The American won four straight holes from 11-14 to square things. Despite the collapse, Matsuyama bounced back with a win on the 16th to once again go 1 up but then inexplicably three-putted from 25-feet to lose the 17th and his grasp on a full point. The tied match was like a win to the U.S. Adam Hadwin produced a gutsy performance against Bryson DeChambeau, clawing back from a two-hole deficit early and finding a way to win the 17th hole when it was clear he had to if the Internationals were to have any chance to still win the Cup. Heading down the 18th all square, Hadwin had to win the final hole to keep the slim winning hopes of his team alive. A brilliant approach to just inside 14-feet set the stage for him to be a hero. But as the putt stayed high and missed the hole, so too did the realistic dreams of winning the Cup for the first time since 1998. At least a shared Cup was still in play. Louis Oosthuizen looked impressive for most of Sunday and made the turn with a 3 up lead over Matt Kuchar. As the session played out in became apparent, the Internationals had lost their chance to win the Cup but if the final three matches stayed black they could grab themselves a share of it. Cameron Smith was playing his part against Justin Thomas, surging back from three down to be 2 up with four to play. But Oosthuizen was going the wrong way. By the 15th hole he had lost his lead and looked dead when he drove the ball into the trees on the 16th and was forced to punch out. Only a three-putt from Kuchar saved him. But it was only a short reprieve. Despite Smith closing out a 2&1 win over Thomas ahead Oosthuizen’s approach to 17, a hole he could not afford to lose, bounced past the pin and settled some 16-feet above the hole. Kuchar stiffed his approach to five-feet. When the South African left his putt too far out to the left Kuchar sent his to the bottom of the Cup ensuring a 1 up lead with a hole to play and the vital last half point, the U.S. needed to clinch. The next chance to avenge yet another loss will come in 2021 at Quail Hollow. Given how close they came it can’t come soon enough for the Internationals.  

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Rikuya Hoshino (+10000) … Qualifying for the Olympics in his native Japan is reason enough to celebrate, but he’s also been assigned the opening tee ball at Kasumigaseki Country Club’s East Course on Thursday morning. Fellow countryman Hideki Matsuyama, who is positioned 20th in the Official World Golf Ranking, has hogged international headlines as the first male Japanese golfer to win a major (2021 Masters), but the 25-year-old Hoshino is second-best at 86th in the OWGR and he continues to pace his home circuit’s money list with a trio of victories in the 2020-21 season. The intangible benefits of the home game also should ease him quickly into a comfort zone. Henrik Norlander (+10000) … The 34-year-old from Sweden has had little trouble in retaining his position in the heart of the FedExCup in what is his now his fourth season on the PGA TOUR. He’s 81st in points with a T5 at the Barbasol Championship as the nearest event in his rearview mirror. His performance at Keene Trace was a microcosm of why he’s dangerous every time he pegs it, with better-than-average metrics across the board. His tee-to-green game not only is his moneymaker, it’s also the default expectation to define who medals on the unfamiliar greens of Kasumigaseki. Thomas Detry (+8000) … It’s just a matter of time before he wins for the first time on the European Tour, and if it happens at the Olympics, it’d qualify as his breakthrough since it’s an official event on the circuit. In the last 12 months, the 28-year-old Belgian has a quartet of runner-up finishes, including a pair in his last five starts. Since joining the European Tour in 2017, he’s totaled five seconds and five thirds. While prone to the big number, his proclivity to attack pins is encouraged by large greens and the absence of a cut. Carl Yuan (+15000) … After relocating from his native China to Florida, he played collegiately at the University of Washington for three years before turning professional in 2018. It was that summer when he prevailed as an amateur at the Qingdao Championship on the PGA TOUR China. By 2019, he was a regular on the Korn Ferry Tour where he remains a member. At least for now. Currently 31st in KFT points on the strength of a trio of runner-up finishes among six top 10s, he’s challenging for one of the 25 automatic cards reserved for the 2021-22 PGA TOUR. Ranks 24th in greens hit and second in par-5 scoring average. With that success and his muscle off the tee, the 640-yard par-5 fifth and 625-yard par-5 14th holes will be opportunities for the 24-year-old to separate. Kristian Krogh Johannessen (+40000) … Joins countryman Viktor Hovland and representatives of Norway, and the attention here is all about striking while his irons are hot. It was earlier this month when Johannessen rose to a career-best 280th in the Official World Golf Ranking because the 26-year-old has been lighting up the Challenge Tour for two months. In his most recent six starts on that tour, he’s gone T5-T2-T23-T15-T9-T16. Odds were sourced on Tuesday, July 27 at 5 a.m. ET. For live odds visit betmgm. NOTE: Sleeper is a relative term, so Rob uses unofficial criteria to determine who qualifies. Each of the following usually is determined to be ineligible for this weekly staple: Winners of the tournament on the current host course; winners in the same season; recent major champions; top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking; recent participants of team competitions.

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