McIlroy says Bradley could have curbed 'horrific' Ryder Cup abuse

Rory McIlroy has criticised United States captain Keegan Bradley for not using his platform to calm abusive crowd behaviour during last year's Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black in New York.

Europe retained the trophy with a 15-13 win, becoming the first away team to win since 2012, but McIlroy said the victory came amid relentless heckling that crossed the line.

McIlroy said his wife Erica was hit by a drink thrown by a fan and that he heard "horrific" abuse directed at his family, including comments about his young daughter Poppy that he "couldn't even repeat here."

Speaking on The Overlap, McIlroy said he could brush off some taunts but that the abuse of his family was unacceptable. "We knew going to New York that we were going to get a lot of stick, a lot of abuse," he said.

He said some team-mates had tried to calm the crowd but argued Bradley, as captain, "had the biggest platform of the week" and "could have said something on that Friday or Saturday night, and he didn't."

McIlroy called the conduct "by far" the worst he has experienced, worse than the 2016 Ryder Cup in Minnesota, and compared the behaviour to a mob mentality where a minority of bad actors skew the atmosphere.

He noted Sunday was a little better because the matches were more dispersed, and added that the Ryder Cup remains a great, intensely partisan event for golf despite the problems with crowd behaviour.

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Sports, United States, Ryder Cup, Golf, Mcilroy, Keegan Bradley, Crowd Behaviour