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Vagliano
Great Britain & Ireland looking to break seven-year winless streak
29 Jun 23
3 mins
Great Britain & Ireland will be hoping the links of Royal Dornoch Golf Club provide the perfect setting to win back the Vagliano Trophy from the Continent of Europe. It’s a tall task against a team stronger on paper.
The teams are level 15-15 in the biennial match with one drawn match since the inaugural 1959 contest in it's current format. However, GB&I has lost the last seven matches. You have to go back to 2005 at Golf de Chantilly, France to find a GB&I victory. The Continent of Europe holds a 102 to 66 advantage in total points won since that win.Rankings don’t matter
The average World Amateur Golf Ranking® for the eight Continental Europeans is 38.75 against 69 for GB&I. As history shows, though, biennial matches aren’t played on paper. GB&I captain Maria Dunne will hammer that point home to her eight-players. The Irish woman knows all about the cut and thrust of international team golf: she was a member of the victorious 2016 GB&I Curtis Cup team, played in the 2017 Vagliano Trophy, and captained GB&I in the 2019 Junior Vagliano. “Rankings don’t matter in match play,” Dunne said. “When I draw back from my own experience, we were definitely the underdogs on paper in the 2016 Curtis Cup but we had such belief. I was the highest ranked player on either the GB&I or US team, but it didn’t matter in my head.Confidence abounds
“Anything can happen in match play. This is a links course, the weather is changing over the next two days and it really doesn’t matter if you’re ranked number one or number 100. “I have eight fantastic players. They’re here by merit, and they know what they have to do. I want them to have a memorable, enjoyable experience and we’re going to leave with the trophy. 2005 was the last time we won, but I’m really confident this year we have the team to do it.”
Ingrid Lindblad - Continent of Europe
The European team will be boosted by the world's number one amateur in Ingrid Lindblad of Sweden as they look to retain the Vagliano Trophy from their victory back in 2019.
World number one and three
European team captain Ane Urchegui García, the reigning European Mid-Amateur Ladies' Champion, boasts the number one and three players on the World Amateur Golf Ranking® in Sweden’s Ingrid Lindblad and Cayetana Fernandez Garcia-Poggio of Spain. World number 11 Julia Lopez Ramirez, 14th ranked Meja Ortengren of Sweden and Germany’s Helen Briem at 16th are the other top 20 players. Belgium’s Savannah de Bock is 45th while and Rocio Tejedo of Spain is 50th. Reigning Women’s Amateur champion Chiara Horder is the lowest ranked player at 170th. Urchegui Garcia’s Vagliano Trophy experience comes from captaining junior Continent of Europe teams to consecutive victories in 2017 and 2019. “Maybe with the juniors I have to be more of a big sister since they are so young,” Urchegui Garcia. “I don’t need to do that this week because my players are so mature. They are all strong players. They can feel very proud of themselves to have made this team and I want them to have fun.” She too believes the rankings have little bearing on who emerges victorious. “I don’t think the rankings matter because you never know in golf. You can have a good day or a bad day so anything can happen.”Formidable team
Dunne, who played in the 2017 Vagliano Trophy, sends out a formidable team to try to arrest the seven-match losing streak. England’s Charlotte Heath leads the GB&I charge at eighth on the WAGR table. Scotland’s Hannah Darling and reigning R&A Girls Amateur champion Lottie Woad of England are the other top 20 players at 12th and 18th respectively. English players Caley McGinty at 29th and 91st ranked Rosie Belsham are the other top 100 players. Ireland’s Beth Coulter at 106th, Lorna McClymont at 131st and 157th ranked Aine Donegan fill out the GB&I side.Seasoned links players
Links golf would ordinarily favour the home team. Urchegui García doesn’t think it will be a factor this year. “We don’t have as much experience of links golf as GB&I but my team has competed on a lot of links courses and this experience is nothing new to them.” Proof of that lies in Europe’s 14 ½ – 9 ½ at Royal St George’s in 2019, the last time the match was played. Home fans will be hoping Dunne’s eight women can handle Royal Dornoch’s par-73, 6,144-yard Championship course just a wee bit better than their European opponents.The Amateur
2022 Junior Vagliano Highlights
It was a day full of drama at Blairgowrie as the Continent of Europe and Great Britain and Ireland battled it out for the Junior Vagliano Trophy.
27 Jun 23
07.02