Tiger Woods was furious as a wardrobe malfunction forced Team USA to spend £4,000 on a Ryder Cup merchandise tent

It’s entirely plausible that Team USA lost the 2010 Ryder Cup because the captain’s wife wanted to sew names onto the jackets.

Later this month, Zach Johnson’s star-studded team heads to Europe to attempt to win the iconic event on foreign soil for the first time in 30 years.

But those three decades were filled with comical levels of disaster for Americans on the continent.

Over the years, Team Europe has exposed its opponents by paying attention to every painful detail at home.

Only recently did Team USA follow the path of the Europeans by going beyond the game of golf itself to focus on tactics and chemistry in the locker room.

And there is no better example than Celtic Manor in 2010.

Captain Corey Bavin decided that his wife, Lisa, would be heavily involved in the team’s preparations.

But no one could have predicted the sheer force of its influence on the event.

It started when Corey got into a heated argument with Golf Channel reporter Jim Gray in the media center.

Gray posted quotes from the Team USA captain as he guaranteed Tiger Woods a spot on the team, despite questionable form and a recent public scandal.

Gray was branded a “liar”, and onlookers remember a gif of Mrs Baffin defending her husband, calling the journalist “brilliant”.

She became a golf celebrity, even appearing on the cover of Avid Golfer magazine, wearing only the USA flag.

However, her most important and fateful role was designing the uniforms for Team USA.

As the Ryder Cup was to be held in Wales in October, effective waterproof gear was likely to be essential.

As expected, players were greeted by torrential rain on opening day.

Bavin sent the Americans out wearing jackets that made them look like a college basketball team, with the names stitched on the back.

Woods was reportedly angry that he couldn’t use waterproof Nike gear.

To make matters worse, the American star had to find a generic jacket without the word “Woods” on the back after his own jacket was deemed too large.

So you can imagine his anger when Sun Mountain’s jackets didn’t work.

“We were disappointed with their performance and have fixed the problem,” Captain Baffin said.

“They didn’t do what we wanted them to do, so we went out and bought more waterproof material.”

This doesn’t tell the whole story.

In a truly embarrassing moment, Team USA lined up at a fan merchandise tent and spent more than £4,000 on rain gear.

Cherry on top? They used Team Europe supplier ProQuip.

Sun Mountain defended itself in a statement and privately suggested that the stitching added by Lisa Baffin to the jackets was the cause of the leak.

Woods, who was playing alongside Steve Stricker against Ian Poulter and Ross Fisher, ultimately decided not to wear his jacket despite the torrential weather.

But the team bags also failed to keep water out, meaning towels and racket handles were soaking wet.

Rory McIlroy, who already angered Woods when he suggested the entire European team wanted to play with him, tweeted: “Just gotta say our waterproofs are performing very well!”

To the relief of the Americans, play was suspended before 10am – and they even managed to win the action session by 2½ to 1½ when it ended on Saturday.

Europe came back to win the event by a score of 14½ to 13½, marking the closest Ryder Cup on this side of the Atlantic in recent memory.

Given how close the Ryder Cup was to an end, attention turned back to that rainy opening morning, where neither of the top two U.S. pairs managed to pick up a single point.

Dustin Johnson and Phil Mickelson were hit 3 and 2, while Stuart Cink and Matt Kuchar could only secure the first inning.

In hindsight, one shot in that second game was enough to swing the Ryder Cup.

They fired some shots while completely overwhelmed.

Which is why 2010 at Celtic Manor should forever be known as the Lisa Bavin Ryder Cup.