Thomas Bjørn sets medal goal for Denmark after being announced as Captain of Olympic golf team

Thomas Bjørn is hoping to inspire the next generation of Danish golfers by overseeing his country win a medal at the 2024 Olympic Games.

Bjørn, Denmark’s most successful ever golfer, was announced as the captain of his country’s Olympic golf team on Tuesday.

The 52-year-old will head up both the men’s and women’s teams competing at Le Golf National – scene of his Ryder Cup triumph as Captain in 2018 – this summer.

With the Højgaard twins and Thorbjørn Olesen in fine form on the worldwide stage in the men’s game and Emily Pedersen and Nanna Koerstz Madsen both having featured in the Solheim Cup, Bjørn is excited by the role as the countdown to the world's biggest multi-sports event continues.

“It is a great opportunity,” he told the DP World Tour.

“On the men’s side I have a great relationship with our top players, and they were keen on me to do it.

"On the women’s side I have got some work ahead of me to get to know the ladies that are going to play.

"I still know them pretty decently. I will get to know their game a little more but it is something on the back of 2018 (Ryder Cup captaincy) that I look forward to doing."

Bjørn, who reached 600 DP World Tour starts last season, was speaking in the build-up to the DP World Tour's return to the Kingdom of Bahrain for the first time in 13 years this week.

He added: "To try and win a medal is a big goal of ours and with the talent we have I see no reason why we couldn’t."

Over the course of a career spanning three decades, Bjørn has won 15 DP World Tour titles and played on three Ryder Cup teams, winning on each occasion.

However, with golf having only returned to the Olympic programme in 2016, the 52-year-old didn't have the chance to represent his country during his best years as a player.

But due to the global power of the Olympics, he believes success could result in golf growing further in his homeland.

"I played for a long time, the Olympics was never in my grasp," he added.

"Golf wasn’t on the programme when I was at my best and now looking at it I find it a shame that golf wasn’t on the programme back then.

"It would have been nice to have been a three, four, five time Olympian and try to be a part of that whole thing. I think it is important for the game.

"I think it is important for golf in our country that it is an Olympic sport and that we try with the talent that we have to see if we can win some medals because in a country like Denmark it can change the view of a sport and it can be part of a national movement which the Olympics always is for a small country."

When are the Olympic Games in 2024?

The Games will be staged from July 26 to August 11.

The men’s Olympic golf event is set to take place from August 1-4, with the women’s tournament being staged from August 7-10.

Both events will be played at Le Golf National, a European Tour Destinations member venue, located in Guyancourt on the outskirts of Paris.

The Albatros course previously staged the 2018 Ryder Cup and has been a long-serving host of the Open de France on the DP World Tour.

There will be 120 athletes competing in the golf competition of Paris 2024, 60 in each of the men’s and women’s events, which is exactly the same amount as Tokyo 2020.

The host nation France will secure two quota places, one per gender. The other 118 quota places (59 per gender) will be decided by the Olympic Golf Ranking (OGR).