Ryan Fox believes that New Zealand would be better equipped to host the Presidents Cup than to be a regular PGA Tour stop following recent comments made by Scottie Scheffler.
Fox, of course, ensured that his name will go down in the incredible pantheon of New Zealand’s great sporting history with his victory at The Open Championship last week.
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It was an amazing performance over the weekend at Royal Birkdale from the Kiwi, who became the country’s fourth major champion.
It felt particularly significant that the 39-year-old won at a time when the PGA Tour is looking to visit more places around the world in the coming years.
Ryan Fox hopes the Presidents Cup can be held in New Zealand
Playing golf in New Zealand is a bucket list item for the large majority of those who ever pick up a set of clubs. There are a number of breathtaking golf courses that are surrounded by the most spectacular landscapes.
Rory McIlroy visited a handful of those courses back in December 2024, with Tara Iti widely considered the most iconic.
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Meanwhile, Scottie Scheffler spoke about his desire to visit New Zealand ahead of the Scottish Open earlier this month.
“I love golf and I would love to be able to play more internationally. Like Australia; New Zealand is a place we would love to be able to go to. My wife has always wanted to go to New Zealand,” he said.
“But like I said, I love this style of golf, and I feel like it’s pretty unique to here. But going to play the Sandbelt in Australia would be pretty special as well. Hopefully I can find the time. It’s definitely an intriguing part of the schedule and yeah, it definitely interests me, as well.”
Fox was asked on The Smylie Show about the chances of New Zealand hosting a PGA Tour event in the future following Scheffler’s comments.
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He suggested that one particular event stands out as an option.
“I’d like to say yes, but I don’t know if we’re a big enough market for it. But we definitely have some scope to have something great,” he said.
Photo by Warren Little/Getty Images
“The New Zealand Open is a great event down there. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to go down the last few years with how the schedule’s worked out, but you get to play in Queenstown. It’s just an amazing place. I was talking to Tom Kim about it the other day. He played down there a few years ago, and we’re still talking about it. He loves it, he wants to go back at some point. Again, the schedule makes it very hard. But everyone who goes down there raves about it.
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“I’m biased. It’s home for me. It will always be home. Even though we’re in Florida mainly, New Zealand’s where we’re going to end up regardless.
“To hear someone like Scottie say that, it’s pretty awesome for New Zealand. Rory coming down was massive. But Scottie saying in a press conference that he wants to go down and play New Zealand and Australia; Australia’s amazing, they’ve got some great golf courses. That Sandbelt might be the best collection of golf courses in a small area anywhere in the world. That’s incredible. But we’re doing pretty well as a pretty small country, and to have those guys be publicly vocal about it, that’s only going to do good things for our country.
“It would be great to see maybe a Presidents Cup go down there, or something going forward. We may not have the scope, the population base, to host a PGA Tour event year-in, year-out, but to do it once and do it big, like a Presidents Cup, we could do that.”
The next international venue set to host the Presidents Cup in 2028
Fox will almost certainly make his Presidents Cup debut this year, with the International team looking to win the event for only the second time ever at Medinah.
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Of course, golf fans know all too well that there is certainly the potential for some magic at Medinah, on a course that captain Geoff Ogilvy helped redesign.
The event will return to Australia in 2028, with Kingston Heath set to become only the second course in the country to host the cup after Royal Melbourne.
Interestingly, Rory McIlroy claimed that Kingston Heath is the best course in Melbourne last year. So fans of the Presidents Cup are in for a treat.
And hopefully the event will indeed one day head to Fox’s home country.
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