Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\nBut the reputation of an event that has grown in stature in recent years was diminished by the actions of disgraceful spectator behaviour.<\/p>\n
McIlroy and his good friend, and afternoon playing partner Shane Lowry, were the main victims of the tirade of abuse from the galleries and grandstands.<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1758410048_740_poster-fallback.png\"\/)
<\/p>\n
They were relentless sworn at, jeered during their backswings or as they putted, but the abuse was far worse than disregarding golf etiquette.<\/p>\n
Golf Digest\u2019 senior writer Joel Beall walked the course during McIlroy and Lowry\u2019s fourball match against Justin Thomas and Cameron Young, which the Irishmen won 2 up for the record, and was sickened by what he heard from patrons.<\/p>\n
Derogatory comments about McIlroy\u2019s wife and family were made as well as \u201ca woman who wasn\u2019t McIlroy\u2019s wife\u201d.<\/p>\n
Lowry was the constant target of remarks about his weight.<\/p>\n
There is a road underpass players must walk through to get from the first green to the second tee, and Beall shared what he witnessed as McIlroy made that walk.<\/p>\n
\u201cA gauntlet of fans awaited him, middle fingers extended, hurling emasculating comments about his stature and challenging his manhood with crude gestures. The few European fans present shouted desperate encouragement\u2014:Ignore the noise! We\u2019ve got your back!\u201d\u2014but their voices were swallowed by hostility. McIlroy kept his eyes fixed on the ground, shoulders hunched,\u201d Beall wrote.<\/p>\n
\u201cOn the second tee McIlroy exchanged brief words with caddie Harry Diamond before selecting his club. One practice swing was all it took. \u201cRory, don\u2019t let your boyfriend down!\u201d came the shout from the left side of the tee box, followed by three more homophobic slurs that cannot be printed. A nearby state trooper tilted his head, scanning for the source, but remained frozen in place, unwilling or unable to act. McIlroy\u2019s tee shot launched as fans screamed for it to sail out of bounds.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the European fans sing endearing songs about the players, and make witty banter towards the opposition, the home spectators resorted to all out abuse.<\/p>\n
McIlroy called for a referee at one point to see if there was anything that could be done about calls of \u201cf*** you Rory!\u201d during his putting stroke.<\/p>\n
State troopers had to be called in to create a barrier between the players and spectators.<\/p>\n
It was ugly.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese scenes shouldn\u2019t have surprised anyone,\u201d Beall also wrote. <\/p>\n
\u201cNew York golf tournaments have long been breeding grounds for fan disturbances, and Bethpage carries its own notorious reputation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe European team had arrived prepared, boasting about VR headset training sessions designed to simulate crowd hostility. They claimed to be ready for the worst. But no simulation could replicate the toxic alchemy at work here: alcohol mixed with entitlement, rudeness fused with xenophobia.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs the group made the turn to the back nine, the match was deadlocked at all square. But if the front nine was any indication of what lay ahead, what was transpiring at Bethpage was no longer golf.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIlroy lost his cool at times, including when he shouted \u201cshut the f*** up\u201d at spectators during his morning foursomes match with Tommy Fleetwood, which he also won.<\/p>\n
The day prior, he flipped US fans the middle finger as he let out his frustrations.<\/p>\n
McIlroy flips the bird at the Ryder Cup! | 00:26<\/p>\n
He also let out some mighty celebrations on the back nine, and pointed to the scoreboard as a reminder to the heckling patrons.<\/p>\n
But The Masters champion largely remained calm, and tried to stay diplomatic after his round.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, when you play an away Ryder Cup it\u2019s really, really challenging,\u201d McIlroy said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not for me to say, people can be their own judge of whether they took it too far or not.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just proud of us for being able to win today with what we had to go through.\u201d<\/p>\n
Below are some reactions from reporters who were on the ground at Bethpage Black for an infamous Saturday afternoon in Ryder Cup history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Ryder Cup hit boiling point on the second afternoon of the three-day event in New York as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174192,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[113266,2095,64,63,25584,113259,113265,2490,2057,113270,51331,113257,25299,113264,113258,113261,113267,113263,2328,113255,6919,1025,2041,2067,113262,113223,113260,3576,756,113269,1656,113268,3595,85,113256,11181,2508,2614,113254],"class_list":["post-174191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-afternoon-playing-partner","tag-america","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-being-able","tag-desperate-encouragement","tag-disgraceful-spectator-behaviour","tag-donald-trump","tag-europe","tag-european-fans-sing","tag-european-team","tag-fan-disturbances","tag-golf-etiquette","tag-golf-tournaments","tag-harry-diamond","tag-heckling-patrons","tag-hit-boiling-point","tag-home-spectators","tag-italy","tag-joel-beall","tag-justin-thomas","tag-new-york","tag-north-america","tag-northern-america","tag-practice-swing","tag-putting-stroke","tag-road-underpass-players","tag-rome","tag-rory-mcilroy","tag-senior-writer","tag-shane-lowry","tag-simulate-crowd-hostility","tag-southern-europe","tag-sports","tag-state-troopers","tag-tee-box","tag-tee-shot","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-worst-behaviour"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174191"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174191\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}