European captain Luke Donald will have six captain’s picks – twice the amount of his predecessor Padraig Harrington – with which to shape his team for the 2023 Ryder Cup against the US in Italy.
Six players will qualify automatically, with that process starting at the BMW PGA Championship in early September.
Qualification will end three weeks before next year’s Ryder Cup starts.
Harrington had three wildcards while his counterpart Steve Stricker had six as Europe were thrashed 19-9 last year.
New US captain Zach Johnson will again have six wildcard picks as he seeks to defend the trophy at Marco Simone on the outskirts of Rome from 29 September to 1 October 2023.
Three players will qualify automatically for Donald’s team from the European Points list along with the top three from the World Points list.
In another tweak to the process, the ratio between the highest and lowest-ranked events on the DP World Tour in terms of the points allocation has been reduced from a factor of 6:1 (12,000 points vs 2,000 points) to a factor of 4:1 (6,000 points vs 1,500 points).
Donald replaced Henrik Stenson as captain earlier this month when the Swede was sacked for defecting to LIV Golf.
The Englishman was an assistant to Thomas Bjorn in Paris four years ago and was again part of the backroom team led by Harrington in the record defeat at Whistling Straits in 2021.
Four members of that team – Sergio Garcia, Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter and Bernd Wiesberger – have been recruited by LIV Golf and it is unclear if they will be available to play in Italy.
The 2021 US side has lost Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed to the LIV Golf series.
Analysis
BBC golf correspondent Iain Carter
Europe were outflanked by America’s switch to six picks for the last Ryder Cup, when the qualifying period was affected by the Covid pandemic.
The build up to the 2023 match is even more uncertain because of the unprecedented insurgence of the rival LIV circuit, so it makes sense for Donald to match his opposite number, Zach Johnson, in being able to select half of his 12-man team independent from qualifying tables.
Elevating the importance of lesser events by shifting weighting of points for tournaments worth less than $2m helps maintain their relevance to DP World Tour hopefuls.
Significantly, Donald still does not know whether he will be able to select players who have defected to LIV.
Given Rory McIlroy’s assertion he will find it “hard to stomach” playing with LIV golfers at next week’s PGA Championship at Wentworth, how can Donald field a harmonious European team if he chooses rebels to play in Rome?
