The Ryder Cup 2025 gets under in New York on Friday – and there’s a face familiar to many Premier League fans.
Chelsea legend Gianfranco Zola has been spotted during the practice rounds and somehow has made it into Europe’s official team photo.
The question is… how did the diminutive Italian find himself as part of Ryder Cup preparations?
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Gianfranco Zola has a role at the 2025 Ryder Cup
Gianfranco Zola looks on (Image credit: Andrew Redington/Getty Images)
Plenty of footballers are into their golf: famously, Gareth Bale was said to value the game above Real Madrid, while Harry Kane and Pep Guardiola are fans of the sport – and Jimmy Bullard said to be seriously good at it.
Yet somehow, Zola – ranked at no.51 in FourFourTwo’s list of the greatest Premier League players of all time – has beaten them all to Europe’s Ryder Cup team.
Gareth Bale loves his golf (Image credit: Alamy)
The 59-year-old actually has a role to play for Europe, as vice-captain Francesco Molinari’s designated buggy driver.
Zola’s played in a number of pro-am events on the DP World Tour, even representing Team World at the inaugural Reignwood Icons of Football tournament.
Molinari, meanwhile, is golf’s first Italian major champion: he originally struck up a close friendship with the former Blue when he moved to London in 2009, and Zola was managing West Ham United.
One man who was in for a nice surprise was Europe’s Justin Rose, who supports Chelsea.
Zola is a big golfer
“I didn’t know he was coming this week, he was one of the first people I bumped into,” Rose gushed. “I was star-struck, which is amazing.”
Zola is one of the greatest players ever to have never won the Champions League – let’s see if he lifts a major European title yet.
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