Flag of Europe

With golf being such an international game, it's easy to forget how important home country wins can be for the hundreds of players competing around the world.

Padraig Harrington headed into the final round of the Irish Open, this week's European Tour stop, with a three shot advantage over Welshman Bradley Dredge and England's Simon Wakefield.

A win for Harrington would be a first by an Irish golfer in the Irish Open in a quarter of a century.

Harrington was buoyed, of course, by the large partisan crowd following him and he said, "It was very exciting playing and I have to use that to my advantage when I need to and play it down when I need to".

Harrington is ranked 12th in the world at the moment and he could afford to take the Irish Open lightly. He's making plenty of money on the PGA Tour along with the European Tour events, he's a shoe-in to make the Ryder Cup team again, so why get excited about the Irish Open?

It's the love of playing for one's country that motivates Harrington. Indeed, it motivates many of the European players in international competitions.

Combined with the fact that European players make better team players than American golfers, it's the love of international competition that has been keeping the Ryder Cup locked up on the other side of the Atlantic.

If and when golf becomes an Olympic sport, much of that same love of international competition will stand European golfers in good stead and the first gold medal to be awarded in Olympic golf competition will likely go to a European golfer.

That's not something Americans like to hear but the fact of the matter is that the time of American domination on the world golf stage is over.

A post more than a year ago at Ian Andrew's blog on golf course architecture shed some light on this point.

In a departure from his usual excellent commentary on course design, Andrew explored how Sweden encourages the game among amateurs.

The Swedes successfully established a grass-roots system of introducing kids to the game by making golf a family affair. As a result, in a nation of some 9 million, more than 20% of the country plays the game!

That might explain why so many Swedes are playing the game professionally on both the men's and women's tours around the world - and playing well, too.

The European Tour offers the chance every week for a golfer to play for flag and country - as well as prize money.

The PGA Tour offers just the money each week. Only the US Open and the Masters serve to stir the blood.