Danny Willett, Justin Rose commit to Olympic team for Great Britain

With so many top-tier golfers dropping out of the Rio Olympics due to recent Zika virus scares, Team GB is sitting pretty.

At this rate, no country will have any golfers to show for in the 2016 Olympics taking place in Rio. But Zika can’t scare away everyone … right?

Justin Rose and Danny Willett said earlier today that they will be representing Great Britain in the upcoming Olympics. Rose, ranked 11th in the world, and Willett, ranked 9th, will look to add an Olympic medal to their resumes.

Unless you’re an avid golf fan, Willett isn’t quite the household name that Jordan Spieth, Jason Day or Rory McIlroy are. But Willett made some noise at Augusta this past year when he took home his first green jacket at the Masters.

Rose won the US Open in 2013 and has made 10 of 13 cuts this season with a top finish of third, which came at the Wells Fargo Championship in May.

Rose said competing at the Olympics would be “right there alongside the major championships,” but that he could not compare the two.

“If I could fast forward 10 years I would like my career to read, ‘Justin Rose: multi-major champion and Olympic gold medallist’,” he said.

Countries can have up to four golfers represent them, so it wouldn’t come as a surprise to see players like Chris Wood and Paul Casey throw their names in the hat and represent GB.

Countries are allowed up to four players under the condition that all of them are ranked among the top 15 in the world. The rest of the field is determined using the world rankings, with a two-player maximum from each country that didn’t have more than two players in the top 15. Wood and Casey are ranked 22nd ad 29th, respectively.

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