Denmark wins the World Cup of Golf

The Danes are the champions of the World Cup of Golf.

The duo of Soren Kjeldsen and Thorbjorn Olesen won the biennial two-man team event at Kingston Heath in Australia on Sunday, holding off a trio of teams for a three-shot win at 20-under 268.

The U.S. team of Rickie Fowler and Jimmy Walker, the French duo of Victor Dubuisson and Romain Langasque and the Chinese team of Wu Ashun and Haotong Li all finished tied for second place.

The final day of the competition — just as the second round — was played as a best-ball competition, with the Danes shooting a 6-under 66 to hold off the surging Frenchmen, who shot 63. The Swedish duo of Alex Noren and David Lingmerth had the low final round, shooting 62 to finish alone in fifth place.

Kjeldsen said he reveled in the opportunity to play in a two-man team, drawing on emotion he didn’t previously experience.

“I think the psychology has been really interesting for me because like when you play your own game, it’s different, but when you’ve got a guy like this on the back nine on Sunday, it’s like you feel you want to die for the guy,” he said. “It’s different and that’s been really interesting to feel this. I sort of get the sense why teams get so together when they play well. I’ve never really experienced that before this week.”

The Danes owned the better-ball format, however, shooting 60 in Round 2 to play the two rounds combined in 18 under par. They managed to play the alternate-shot rounds in 2 under par.

The Americans were the better team in alternate shot, fitting given Fowler’s and Walker’s experience as a duo in the Ryder Cup. They were 5 under par in foursomes, but they were unable to put together their best team golf in the best-ball format.

Olesen admitted he was particularly pleased to be a part of the team that took down the Americans.

“It was great, to be honest,” he said. “They’re both really, really nice guys, Rickie and Jimmy, and we had a good time out there. But obviously America’s a huge country and Denmark is a very, very little country and it’s definitely a nice feeling to beat them.”

Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.