CLEARWATER, Fla. — You would be forgiven for thinking that Tiger Woods’s much-anticipated press conference at the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas was the most captivating golf happening on this Tuesday in December. It was not. The most entertaining action unfolded in a carpeted conference room at Feather Sound Country Club, here on Florida’s west coast, where eight of European golf’s leading lights from the past three-plus decades joyfully presided at a dais in the prelude to the Skechers World Champions Cup.
The World Champions Cup is a relative newcomer to the professional golf calendar, a three-team (U.S, Europe and rest of the world), three-day contest for the 50-and-older set that is essentially a mashup of the Ryder and President Cups, albeit with a different fomat (sixballs and scotch sixsomes!) and a more complicated scoring system. In 2023, the Americans won the inaugural playing in nail-biting fashion with 221 points, while last year’s event was nixed on account of inclement weather. That brings us to the 2025 edition, where, in the all-important Team Vibes category, Europe — no surprise — has jumped out to a commanding lead.
Here was Darren Clarke, Europe’s playing-captain, cackling as he entered his team’s Tuesday-morning session with reporters; there was one of Clarke’s five playing teammates, the pony-tailed Spaniard, Miguel Ángel Jiménez, wearing the European flag like a cape; and, look, is that 55-year-old Alex Cejka with his hat spun around backward?! As Colin Montgomerie, who is 62, clambered up to the stage, his teammates jokingly groaned, then celebrated when Monty successfully arrived at the summit. This wasn’t a winner’s press conference, but it sure felt like one.
Filling out Clarke’s team are Thomas Bjorn and Bernhard Langer, along with vice captains Soren Kjeldsen and Jesper Parnevik, who used the occasion of his opening remarks to reveal: “I have made all the mistakes I can make this week. I got lost driving here. I couldn’t find the 1st tee in Sunday’s match with Darren. I couldn’t find the 10th tee yesterday. And I just today figured out how to work the shower in the hotel.”
Parnevik wasn’t the only player perplexed by the plumbing. When Montgomerie’s turn came for an opening statement, he said, “I’d just like to start by asking Jesper how the shower actually does work? I haven’t quite found out, and I’ve been here three days, Christ.”
And so it went. Cracks, quips, barbs, laughs.
When Clarke mistakenly said that his team would be ready to play when the matches begin Friday, Parnevik quickly corrected his captain, deadpanning, “I think we’re starting Thursday.”
“Yeah, Thursday,” Clarke said, laughing. “Yeah, when Thursday comes along, we are here to try to win this week, make no mistake. We want to do ourselves probably a little better than we did last time and get ourselves right in the mix.”
Clarke wasn’t just paying lip service. The guys aren’t here this week only for giggles. Last time around — at The Concession Golf Club, an hour’s drive south of here — the event came down to a Sunday clash between the U.S. and International sides. The Internationals had control of their own destiny, but then both Vijay Singh and Retief Goosen dumped their approach shots into a penalty area on the final hole, essentially handing the title to the U.S. “Kind of like throwing a Hail Mary touchdown in the last 10 seconds and then getting the onside kick and kicking a field goal,” Peter Jacobsen, the World Champions Cup tournament chairman, told me Tuesday. “We were in shock.”
As the Americans celebrated, the other teams’ skippers — Clarke and Ernie Els — stewed.
“Darren was pissed, and Ernie was pissed. So pissed,” Jacobsen said. “Because it means so much. There’s no age limit on competitive desire. Whether you’re 7 or 57, it doesn’t matter.”
This week, the U.S. playing-captain is Jim Furyk; his team is comprised of Stewart Cink, Jerry Kelly, Justin Leonard, Steve Stricker and Jason Caron, and vice captains Steve Flesch and Billy Andrade. International playing-captain Mike Weir will tee it up alongside Angel Cabrera, K.J. Choi, Steve Alker, Y.E. Yang and Mark Hensby; Weir’s assistants are Charlie Wi and Ricardo Gonzalez.
The Americans haven’t been letting the Europeans have all the fun. On Monday night, the U.S. team members sounded like they stayed up past their bedtimes. “Too many drinks probably to start the week off,” Stricker said. “That’s the way we ended two years ago, and we had a ball.”
Added Justin Leonard: “Need some electrolytes, please.”
However you feel about “Silly Season” events in the window between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it’s hard not to appreciate the assemblage of global talent that took the dais here Tuesday morning. For golf fans of a certain era, Feather Sound this week feels a little bit like one of those baseball fantasy camps that populate this area of Florida. But instead of World Series winners, you get major champions. Wander the property and you might spot Y.E. Yang, who famously upset Tiger Woods at the 2009 PGA Championship; or a Masters champion such as Mike Weir or Angel Cabrera; or an ageless wonder like 68-year-old Bernhard Langer.
On Tuesday afternoon, Montgomerie had just finished a nine-hole practice round when Langer’s tugged approach into the 9th green nearly doinked Monty on the head.
You couldn’t have blamed Montgomerie for being salty, but instead he quickly laughed it off. There’s a lot of that on this team.
“You would get that in a Ryder Cup setting, too” Montgomerie told me greenside. “We make fun of each other, take the mickey out of each other, take the piss out of each other. We leave our egos behind and all fight for each other.”
