At Least It's Not Dubai: Turkey Eyes 2022 Ryder Cup Bid

And as Bernie McGuire reports, Rory McIlroy and Justin Rose supported the idea when asked about Ahmet "Head Butt" Agaoglu's desire to launch a Turkish Golf Federation supported bid.  Of course the lads are both carrying quite a bit of cash from their recent visit there, so it would rude to say otherwise.

As you know, it's a European Tour tradition to hang a for sale sign on their most important event, regardless of course quality and as we learned not long ago, location.  Dubai was kicked around as a possibility, before sanity prevailed. And since Turkey is also not a European union member, it might take some convincing to send the Ryder Cup there.

Comments

[Hawkeye]

Not in the EU? Heck, assuming the referred site is where they played that cash grab recently, it's east of The Bosphorus strait and therefore not even in Europe at all! Sanity, please!

[OB]

If anyone from Turkey were good enough, would they be eligible for the Ryder Cup? If not, then it would be insanity to take it to a country where the golfers are not eligible.

[Hawkeye]

Interesting thought! Only 3% of Turkey's land mass is a part of Europe, and if the player hails from that part then I assume he could play. But how they would govern this issue I have no idea.
It's a bit like deciding what country a player would represent in the Olympics if he came from one country politically, but from a part of that country that was governed by another country's golfing union - but what are the odds of such a boneheaded situation ever arising? ;)

[Smacking the Featherie]

Most of Turkey's golf courses are on the Asian side of the country.

The part of the country that they are spending a fortune trying to promote for golf tourism is Anatalya which is on the Med.

Except perhaps for some goat paths, I don't think there are any legitimate golf courses capable of staging a Ryder Cup west of Istanbul.

So, has the Ryder Cup evolved from GB&I to Europe to Eurasia?

"Now, teeing off for Team Eurasia, Rory McIlroy"

[Ghillie]

As the Ryder Cup first open date is 2022, I think the ET is banking on Turkey getting into the EU by then. If it doesn't, it will almost inevitably have dropped from consideration -- for either economic or geopolitical reasons.

[Hawkeye]

Turkey has zero chance of joining the EU within the next decade unless they find oil in their part of the Black Sea, in which case they won't want to join anymore.

[Alan McD]

Maybe I'm missing the point, but what does the EU have to do with being European? The EU is a political and economic alliance, not all geographically confirmed European countries are part of the EU. Turkey is interesting as, stated above, part of it is Europe and part in Asia. But for football purposes, they are part of UEFA and their club and national teams have long played European competitions. So.... definitely a European country, and not an issue to be considered for a Ryder Cup. In a geographical sense at least.