McIlroy: Pain of missing Ryder Cup will hit home now with LIV rebels
Rory McIlroy has labelled his American Ryder Cup rival Patrick Cantlay a ‘d***’ after the Northern Irishman clashed with Cantlay’s caddie Joe LaCava in Rome last month. McIlroy led Team Europe to a dominant 16.5-11.5 over Team USA, winning more points than any player across the week.
For the most part, everything went to plan for McIlroy and his teammates, apart from a heated blip in Saturday’s fourball clashes. McIlroy and Matt Fitzpatrick took on Cantlay and Wyndham Clark in the final match on day two, which was won by the Americans at the final hole.
Cantlay had found himself at the centre of controversy throughout the day after Sky Sports reported that the American had led a fallout within the US camp due to players not being paid to compete. In protest, it was alleged that Cantlay refused to wear a cap whilst playing, a claim since rubbished by the man himself.
Throughout the day’s play, the home crowd taunted Cantlay by waving their caps in the direction of the former FedEx Cup champion, but it was he who had the last laugh, as his teammates ironically copied the celebration after Cantlay holed what turned out to be the winning putt on the 18th green.
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One man who joined in the celebration was caddie LaCava, but the bag-man appeared to take his a step too far after directing it into the direction of McIlroy, who still had a putt to halve the hole. The European went on to miss and was unsurprisingly outraged at LaCava in the aftermath.
So much so that he confronted the caddie, as well as his American colleague Jim ‘Bones’ Mackay who carries the bag for Justin Thomas. Over a month on it appears there is still no love lost as far as McIlroy is concerned. Criticising LaCava – who used to work with Tiger Woods – and Cantlay, he told the Irish Independent: “Joe LaCava used to be a nice guy when he was caddying for Tiger, and now he’s caddying for that d*** [Cantlay].”
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McIlroy’s comments were made in the direction of Brooks Koepka’s coach Claude Harmon and caddie Rickie Elliott, after he came across the pair in the hotel moments after the clash. The Northern Irishman also revealed had missed calls and messages from both Woods and LaCava.
“I went back to my room and there was a text from Joe LaCava: ‘Hey Rory, would love to meet up in the morning to clear the air.’ But I was tired and didn’t get back to him,” he added. There were also three texts and two missed calls from Tiger, because they’re obviously still close. I sent him a quick message: ‘It will be fine … long day … just want to go to bed.’”
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