| Date: 22-24 September Venue: Finca Cortesin, Spain |
| Coverage: Daily live text and radio commentary, plus television highlights on BBC2 on Friday and Sunday and BBC4 on Saturday at 19:00 BST |
United States captain Stacy Lewis says it is “1000% a massive missed opportunity” that the Solheim and Ryder Cups have not been promoted together.
The 18th Solheim Cup between Europe’s women and the US starts on Friday at Finca Cortesin in Andalucia, Spain.
However, there is little connection to the biennial men’s equivalent, which begins a week later in Rome.
“I’d like them [to stay] in the same year if we could get some common ground and do them together,” said Lewis.
Former world number one Lewis, 38, who twice won the Solheim Cup as a player, is the youngest captain in the competition’s history.
And it has already been confirmed that she will remain at the helm on home soil in Gainesville, Virginia, when the event, which was first contested in 1990, reverts to even numbered years in 2024 at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club.
The Solheim Cup moved from even to odd years in 2003, when the Ryder Cup switched from odd to even after being cancelled in 2001 following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
At the time, Richard Relton, the then European director for the Solheim Cup, said: “Given the huge public, television and commercial interest it now generates, it is appropriate that the match is not played in the same month as the Ryder Cup.”
But with the Ryder Cup now set to remain in odd years, Lewis is disappointed that there has been no crossover on a rare two-week spectacle of thrilling team competition and patriotism across the men’s and women’s game.
Expanding on comments made to BBC Sport in August, Lewis said: “I wish that people could get the sponsorship things out of their head and let’s figure out how we can work together.
“This may not ever happen again. We tried to do a little bit with the guys and just weren’t really able to move things along the way I would have liked.
“I just would like to see it for the good of the game. It’s not to further women’s golf. Let’s further the game of golf in general.
“I probably spent more time on it than I should have. But whether it was timing or it was too late in the process, I don’t know. I mean, to really market it correctly, this probably had to happen two years ago.
“This could have been marketed together, two weeks in Europe, two cups to play for. It was a missed opportunity for the sport of golf.”
“For the game of golf two weeks like this could be really cool if we could continue in the future.”
