The Royal Trophy was a men's professional team

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various Golf club, clubs to hit a Golf ball, ball into a series of holes on a golf course, course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standa ...

tournament which was played between 2006 and 2013. The competing teams represented Europe and Asia. Eight man teams played a series of 16 matches involving foursomes, four-ball and singles for the right to hold a trophy donated by the

King of Thailand The monarchy of Thailand is the constitutional monarchy, constitutional form of government of Thailand (formerly ''Siam''). The king of Thailand (, historically, ''king of Siam''; ) is the head of state and head of the ruling Chakri dynasty. ...

. The first four contests, from 2006 to 2010, were played at the

Amata Spring Country Club The Amata Spring Country Club is a private golf and country club near to Bangkok, the capital of Thailand. It hosted two high-profile golf tournaments which were introduced in 2006, the Royal Trophy is a team competition between Europe and Asia and ...

Chonburi Chonburi (, , IAST: , ) is the capital of Chonburi Province and, as part of the district Mueang Chonburi District, Mueang Chonburi, the List of municipalities in Thailand, seventh-largest city in Thailand. It is about 100 km southeast of Ba ...

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

. In 2011 the event moved to a different venue in Thailand and then moved to

Brunei Brunei, officially Brunei Darussalam, is a country in Southeast Asia, situated on the northern coast of the island of Borneo. Apart from its coastline on the South China Sea, it is completely surrounded by the Malaysian state of Sarawak, with ...

and

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

. The Royal Trophy was one of several team golf tournaments between teams from different regions of the world started since the 1990s, inspired by the popularity of the

Ryder Cup The Ryder Cup is a biennial men's golf competition between teams from Europe and the United States, with hosting duties alternating between venues in Europe and the United States for each edition. The cup is named after the English businessman S ...

. In March 2014 the

European Tour The European Tour, currently titled as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons, and legally the PGA European Tour or the European Tour Group, is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European ...

and the

Asian Tour The Asian Tour is the principal men's professional golf professional golf tours, tour in Asia except for Japan (which has its own Japan Golf Tour). It is also a full member of the International Federation of PGA Tours. Official money events on ...

launched a new team tournament, the EurAsia Cup, also played between teams represented Europe and Asia. The Royal Trophy planned for December 2014 was cancelled and has not been held since.

Event history

Seve Ballesteros, a leading proponent of team golf competitions, captained the European team in the

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tournament, and Japan's Masahiro Kuramoto captained Asia. Europe's team included the highly ranked David Howell and

Paul McGinley Paul Noel McGinley (born 16 December 1966) is an Irish professional golfer who has won four events on the European Tour. At the 2002 Ryder Cup, he famously holed a ten-foot putt on the 18th hole in his match against Jim Furyk at The Belfry which ...

, and former World Number 1s

Nick Faldo Sir Nicholas Alexander Faldo (born 18 July 1957) is an English retired professional golfer and television commentator. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, he was renowned for his dedication to the game, and was ranked No. ...

and Ian Woosnam were Ballesteros's captain's picks. Europe won the inaugural event by 9 points to 7. Europe retained the trophy in

2007 2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year. Events January * January 1 **Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...

with a 12½–3½ victory. The 2008 event was due to take place from 11–13 January, but was postponed due to a 15-day period of national mourning for the

sister A sister is a woman or a girl who shares parents or a parent with another individual; a female sibling. The male counterpart is a brother. Although the term typically refers to a familial relationship, it is sometimes used endearingly to ref ...

, and was ultimately cancelled. The third edition took place in January 2009 with the Asian team winning for the first time. In 2010, Europe regained the trophy, winning by the smallest possible margin, 8½–7½. Europe won again in 2011 but Asia won the trophy again in 2012 after a sudden-death play-off. Europe won the final edition in 2013, again by a small margin, 8½–7½.

Format

The Royal Cup involved various

match play Match play is a scoring system for golf in which a player, or team, earns a point for each hole in which they have bested their opponents; as opposed to stroke play, in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 h ...

competitions between players selected from two teams of eight. The winner of each match scored a point for his team, with half a point each for any match that was tied after the 18 holes. The winning team was determined by cumulative total points. In the event of a tie (8 points each) the Royal Cup was decided by a sudden-death playoff.

Results

Notes and references

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External links

Official site
Japan Golf Tour events Former European Tour events Former Asian Tour events Team golf tournaments Golf tournaments in Thailand Golf tournaments in Brunei Golf tournaments in China Recurring sporting events established in 2006 2006 establishments in Thailand

Event history

Format

Results

See also

Notes and references

External links