Golf:Spain's Alvaro Quiros conceded defeat in his Ryder Cup bid after a third round 73 in the Johnnie Walker Championship at Gleneagles today. It left Simon Dyson as the only player who can force his way in at the final counting event and deny either Swede Peter Hanson or Spaniard Miguel Angel Jimenez.
And falling out of the race left Quiros so flat that he said he would turn down an invitation to attend the match at Celtic Manor in October if it comes his way. Two years ago Nick Faldo asked Martin Kaymer, Nick Dougherty and Ross Fisher if they wanted to be with the team in Louisville after they just missed out.
Kaymer, now golf’s newest major champion and an automatic qualifier for Wales, was the only one to take him up on it.
Current captain Colin Montgomerie called Faldo’s initiative “astute” and added recently: “There are moves afoot to have potential Ryder Cup players of the future on course on this particular occasion.”
But Quiros, who had to win this week to have any chance, said after today’s round sent him down to level par: “I would refuse. I’m pretty sure that I would not be smart enough to see the invitation as a learning experience. It would be more hurting myself that I should be there playing.
“I would be very happy to be there with Martin and the other guys, but I would prefer to keep myself practising and focused on the future. I’m not even sure if I will watch the match. My girlfriend is on holiday, so we may go somewhere.
“Although I was down straight after I played yesterday I went to bed thinking if I played really well I might still have a chance. But not now. My only mistake the last few months was to think too much about the Ryder Cup. I got tired and, more than that, I got frustrated.
“I should have been worried more about just playing well, not how it affected my position. Now I have play well the rest of the season to keep myself in the world top 50.”
Europe’s biggest hitter was 24th in June last year and the 11th highest ranked European. Now he is 47th, with 16 fellow Europeans ahead of him. Dyson also has to win tomorrow and hope that Jimenez is outside the top nine or Hanson outside the top 43.
The English golfer’s birdie at the long seventh lifted him to seven under and only two off the lead, but in eighth spot. Jimenez parred the first three holes and dropped from seventh to 15th — alongside Hanson.