GB&I Plot Curtis Cup Defence In Beverly Hills Heat

Great Britain and Ireland have named an eight-strong Curtis Cup team for their defence against the United States at Bel-Air Country Club, where Catriona Matthew’s side will attempt to retain the famous trophy and do something GB&I have not managed on American soil since 1986.

Matthew’s Side Head To Los Angeles With Trophy In Hand

The 44th Curtis Cup match will be played from Friday 12 to Sunday 14 June at the renowned Los Angeles venue, a place with enough polish to make even a nervous three-footer feel overdressed.

GB&I arrive as holders after their splendidly tight 10½-9½ victory at Sunningdale in 2024. That was not so much a win as a collective act of competitive nerve: narrow, noisy, and deliciously uncomfortable for anyone watching through their fingers.

Now comes the harder part. Retaining the Curtis Cup in America is a rather different examination. The galleries are louder, the conditions unfamiliar, and the United States rarely require a second invitation to remind visitors whose hallway they are standing in.

Catriona Matthew Returns As Captain

Catriona Matthew OBE will captain GB&I for the second time, bringing with her the sort of match play pedigree that does not need much polishing. She guided GB&I to that Sunningdale victory in 2024, played in three Curtis Cup teams herself, won The Women’s Amateur Championship in 1993, lifted the 2009 AIG Women’s Open at Royal Lytham & St Annes, and captained Europe to back-to-back Solheim Cup victories over the United States in 2019 and 2021.

That is a CV with a fair bit of bite in it.

Matthew, who famously led Europe to back-to-back Solheim Cup triumphs in 2019 and 2021, said, “I’m really looking forward to the match at Bel-Air. We have selected eight players who we believe will provide us with the best opportunity of retaining the Curtis Cup against the United States of America.

“With a number of players turning professional since the last match, we have a new, exciting team. In terms of the amateur rankings, we will be the underdogs but we also were at Sunningdale. It’s going to be a challenge but in match play anyone can beat anyone and it’s just trying to instil that belief in my players.

“I’ve enjoyed my role as Captain. It’s great fun to see the next generation come through, getting to know them and trying to help them. We are all preparing to give our best at Bel-Air next month.”

There is the key line, tucked neatly in the middle: underdogs again. Golfers love to pretend they do not notice rankings until they suddenly become useful. Matthew knows exactly where her team sits on paper. She also knows paper has a poor record in foursomes when the putts start misbehaving.

The GB&I Curtis Cup Team

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The GB&I side is made up of the top five players on the World Amateur Golf Ranking® and three selections.

Beth Coulter and Patience Rhodes return from the team that won at Sunningdale, giving Matthew two players with fresh Curtis Cup scar tissue and, more importantly, proof that the United States can be beaten when the match gets tight.

Sophia Fullbrook arrives in excellent form after three wins on the US college circuit with Florida State University this year, while teenager Nellie Ong brings a rather useful bit of local subplot: she has qualified for next month’s US Women’s Open presented by Ally at nearby Riviera on the eve of the Curtis Cup.

That is not a warm-up. That is being dropped into the deep end with a yardage book and a polite smile.

The GB&I team:

Beth Coulter, Ireland, Kirkistown Castle, 22
Sophia Fullbrook, England, The Melbourne Club, 20
Lily Hirst, England, Huddersfield, 23
Isla McDonald-O’Brien, England, Shrewsbury, 19
Charlotte Naughton, England, Longhirst Hall, 18
Nellie Ong, England, Eaton, 19
Patience Rhodes, England, Burnham & Berrow, 22
Davina Xanh, England, Burnham & Berrow, 22

Reserves:

1. Annabel Peaford, England, Walton Heath, 17
2. Emma Fleming, Ireland, Elm Park, 21

Coulter And Rhodes Bring Sunningdale Steel

Beth Coulter is one of two returning players from the 2024 Curtis Cup victory, and that matters. Team match play can make even exceptional amateurs look as though they have borrowed someone else’s hands. Coulter has already walked into that atmosphere and come out with the right result.

The Arizona State University student also brings a broad team golf background, having played in the Vagliano Trophy, World Amateur Team Championship, European Team Championship and Home Internationals. Add in a quarter-final run at The Women’s Amateur Championship in 2023 and runner-up finishes in the Irish Women’s Amateur Open, Irish Women’s Close Championship and several collegiate events in America, and you have a player who should not be easily startled.

Patience Rhodes, meanwhile, is the highest-ranked player in the GB&I team and another survivor of Sunningdale’s delicious chaos. She claimed three-and-a-half points from four matches in the 2025 Vagliano Trophy victory over the Continent of Europe, which is the sort of contribution captains file under “very handy indeed”.

Rhodes, the younger sister of Mimi Rhodes, now a three-time winner on the Ladies’ European Tour, has been a consistently strong performer in college golf for Arizona State University. Her Curtis Cup experience could prove central if this match reaches the Sunday singles with everyone’s pulse doing Riverdance.

Fullbrook Arrives With Winning Form

Sophia Fullbrook may be making her Curtis Cup debut, but she is hardly arriving quietly. The 20-year-old has won three times on the US college circuit for Florida State University this year, taking the Florida State Match Up by five shots in March, tying for victory at the Coach Mo Classic two weeks later, then adding the NCAA Tallahassee Regional.

She was also named to the All-ACC team in May.

Fullbrook’s match play credentials are not ornamental either. In last year’s Vagliano Trophy, she twice partnered Curtis Cup team-mate Patience Rhodes and remained unbeaten as GB&I edged the Continent of Europe after a dramatic final-day fightback.

There is a useful temperament suggested by that sentence. Unbeaten. Final-day fightback. Team format. None of it guarantees anything at Bel-Air, but it does travel well.

Naughton And Ong Add Youthful Punch

Charlotte Naughton is the youngest member of the GB&I Curtis Cup team at 18, though her record is already starting to look like it has been edited by someone impatient.

She won the Junior Orange Bowl in January by seven strokes with a tournament-record ten-under total, joining a roll call that includes Tiger Woods, Inbee Park, Lexi Thompson, Brooke Henderson and Joaquin Niemann. That is not bad company. It is the sort of list that makes your club handicap secretary breathe into a paper bag.

Naughton also represented Europe at the Junior Ryder Cup last year, a week after winning the World Junior Girls Championship in Canada. In 2025, she was runner-up in both the Girls’ Amateur Championship and St Rule Trophy, reached the last-32 of The Women’s Amateur Championship, finished third at the European Nations Cup – Copa Sotogrande and placed fifth in the German International Amateur Championship.

Nellie Ong brings another compelling thread. She played a major role in GB&I’s Vagliano Trophy triumph over the Continent of Europe in 2025, twice winning alongside Lottie Woad before a thumping 6&5 singles victory over Valentine Delon.

She also finished tied-fifth individually at last year’s World Amateur Team Championship in Singapore, helping England to a tied-fourth finish, and has shown strong recent form for Ohio State with runner-up finishes at both the Big Ten Women’s Golf Championships and the Therese Hession Buckeye Invitational.

Her US Women’s Open qualification at Riviera gives her June a particularly spicy flavour. One Los Angeles test would be plenty. Ong has decided to take two.

Hirst, McDonald-O’Brien And Xanh Complete The Eight

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Lily Hirst earned her place after a strong spring. The English Women’s Open Amateur Stroke Play Champion in 2024 won The Comboy Leveret, a WAGR® event played at Formby Ladies and Delamere Forest, then added top-five finishes at the Helen Holm Scottish Women’s Open Championship, Welsh Women’s Open Stroke Play Championship and German International Amateur Championship.

She also set a new women’s course record at Royal Birkdale in 2024, shooting a ten-under-par 65 on her way to winning the Ladies Scratch Trophy. Royal Birkdale rarely hands out compliments. A 65 there is more of a declaration.

Isla McDonald-O’Brien brings knockout pedigree after reaching the quarter-finals of The Women’s Amateur Championship at Nairn in 2025, where she beat Catherine Park and Jazy Roberts. She was also part of GB&I’s victorious Vagliano Trophy team last year, winning each of her singles matches, and has recorded a number of top-five collegiate finishes for Arizona State University.

Davina Xanh arrives in fine form too, with five top-ten and eight top-20 finishes in her last ten ranking events for California State University Fullerton. That run included a maiden collegiate victory at March’s Ping ASU Invitational and a runner-up finish at the Big West Women’s Golf Championship. She also won the St Rule Trophy at St Andrews Links in 2025, finishing one shot clear of team-mate Charlotte Naughton.

Recent Curtis Cup Results Show The Size Of The Task

The recent Curtis Cup record tells a familiar story: GB&I have had their moments, but the United States remain a formidable opponent, particularly at home.

The 2024 win at Sunningdale gives GB&I belief. The 2022 result at Merion offers a sharp little reminder that belief, on its own, is not a golf club.

Bel-Air Awaits A New-Look GB&I Side

This GB&I Curtis Cup team has a little of everything: returning steel, collegiate form, teenage nerve, match play experience and enough recent silverware to make the baggage allowance interesting.

Matthew’s job is to turn individual promise into foursomes chemistry, four-ball rhythm and Sunday singles resolve. That is the hidden art of team golf. Everyone can stripe it on the range. Far fewer can find a way when the match is level, the flag is tucked, and the opponent has just holed something rude from 25 feet.

GB&I will be underdogs at Bel-Air. Matthew has already admitted as much. But they were underdogs at Sunningdale too, and that ended with the trophy heading the right way.

Now they cross the Atlantic chasing retention, history and a first American-soil win since 1986. No pressure, then. Just Los Angeles, the United States, and one rather famous cup sitting there waiting to see who blinks first.