Team Europe are tied 8-8 with Team USA heading into the Sunday singles at the Solheim Cup, after Maja Stark and Linn Grant continued their perfect start and Charley Hull and Lottie Woad struggled again. Anna Nordqvist's side tied both sessions on Friday before winning three of the four points on offer in the morning foursomes, giving them the advantage, only for Team USA to edge the afternoon fourballs and set up a thrilling final day. Stark and Grant delivered again as they claimed an impressive 2&1 win over unbeaten duo Megan Khang and Lauren Coughlin, their third win in as many sessions together, as Hull and Woad fell to a final-hole loss to Yealimi Noh and Andrea Lee.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player Hull and Woad are the first ever to play all four sessions in a Solheim Cup together but have returned just 0.5 points, with Rose Zhang and Auston Kim reducing the deficit further when they beat Leona Maguire and Nastasia Nadaud 3&2. Carlota Ciganda snatched a dramatic half-point with the final putt of Friday's fourballs session and was taken to the 18th again in the bottom match, after a 90-foot birdie from Jennifer Kupcho at the par-four 17th pulled her and Lindy Duncan level. Kupcho delivered more brilliance at the last, holing from over 20 feet to claim a 1up win over Ciganda and Celine Bouter and spark incredible celebrations on the final green.
That dramatic finish leaves Team USA requiring six points on the final day to retain the title, two years on from their home win in Virginia, while Team Europe would require a further 6.5 points for a first outright victory since 2021. The Swedish stars were sent out first again, having ended Nelly Korda and Allisen Corpuz's 100 per cent foursomes record earlier in the day, with Stark holing out from the first fairway to find her second eagle of the day. Coughlin hit back with successive holes from the third, leaving Europe behind for the first time this week, then the two teams shared each hole until Grant won the 11th and 12th with birdies.
Stark joined in by rolling in from 20 feet to win the 13th, lifting them two ahead, then cancelled out Coughlin claiming the 16th by holing a long-range birdie at the next to complete their third win of the week. Khang's defeat was her first in 10 Solheim Cup matches and ended a six-match winning streak, one shy of the record, while Coughlin's loss was the first ever for Team USA. "I think we really turned it on during the back nine," Grant said.
"We really got our things together and started playing like we wanted to. It was a really good game - I think they were just right behind us." Woad and Hull are the first pairing in history to play each of the first four sessions and not return at least one point, having never led during a match where Noh fired an eagle and four birdies over the front nine to reach the turn two ahead. Europe won the opening hole of the back nine but lost the 13th to a Lee birdie, with Woad matching Lee's birdie at the 15th and finding another at the 17th before Team USA closed out another point with a final-hole par.
Nadaud won two sessions with Mimi Rhodes but was sent out in match three alongside Leona Maguire, who chipped in for eagle at the eighth and birdied the next before the Americans delivered a three-hole burst on their way to victory. Both teams then descended to the closing holes to follow the final match, where Ciganda won back-to-back holes from the 13th before Duncan won the next and Kupcho nailed her incredible birdie at the 17th. Another dramatic birdie at the last completed a stunning comeback and left Team USA winning the fourballs session 3-1, leaving the teams level after two days for the third consecutive Solheim Cup on European soil.
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