Being part of a national team and competing in a bi-annual cross-continent tournament brings heaps of pressure on its own. On top of it, imagine if the player hasn’t had the best season and there is skepticism looming over them. We would definitely not want to be in that spot. Lexi Thompson, however, is handling it with grace. 

Thompson earned her spot in the team courtesy of her Rolex World Ranking and is ready to play her sixth Solheim Cup. Meanwhile, questions about her past performances recur in press conferences, and in a recent interview, the disdain over her form cropped up again. Thompson’s response proved sufficient to reestablish the confidence we have in her.

It makes no difference to Lexi Thompson

In a recent press conference, Lexi Thompson was taking questions alongside her Solheim Cup mates Ally Ewing and Danielle Kang. A question to Thompson question pointed out how the match-play format might work out concerning her recent struggles. 

In her reply, Thompson didn’t think that the format of the game had anything to do with the pressure. She opined that irrespective of the format, the players still have to play good golf. 

Moving on to her form, she acknowledged how she hadn’t had the best year so far. Commenting on her mindset toward the game, considering the past year, she said, “Yeah, might not have been the year that I wanted, but this is this week.” Thompson’s focus is clearly on the present. “I’m here with my team this week and going to represent my best.”

To throw some context at the match-play format discussion, here is a quick explainer. In this format, players compete for each hole, and they either win or lose the hole. This is true irrespective of whether it’s a group match or a singles match. Thus, the excess strokes of one hole don’t really carry forward and impact the whole tournament. 

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Getting back to her form, it has been a topic of discussion for quite a while now, especially after her spot in the Solheim Cup team was announced. A short recap of her season so far should shed more light on the matter. 

Lexi Thompson’s underwhelming current season

Of the 11 events she has played in, since March 2023, she has only made the cut in three events. In the Cognizant Founders’ Cup, she finished with a shared 31st position. She got off to a decent start with a 2-under, but the score was negated in the next two rounds. She finished with a 1-over eventually.

Later, in the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, Thompson finished with a shared 47th position. She started off with a bad round of 5-over and could not recover from the shaky start. Thompson managed to not make it worse by staying on even pars and 1-under in the following rounds. 

However, her most recent outing has been a breath of fresh air. In the Kroger Queen City Championship, the 28-year-old scored a 7-under in the tournament overall and finished with a shared 19th position. Interestingly, this came after the Solheim Cup team announcement and the confidence boost from the same might have helped. 

With this promising note, let’s move forward hoping that Thompson was right about this week being her week.  

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