SANDWICH, ENGLAND - There is a great national fret going on in some precincts of the United States golf community these days, a state of angst triggered by the lack of American flags on leaderboards all over the world.

Judging by the British bookmakers’ odds heading into Thursday’s opening round of the 140th Open Championship, there could be something to all those furrowed brows.

Even though Americans have won seven — okay, Tiger has three of them — of the last 11 Open Championships, the highest-regarded golfer sporting the stars ‘n stripes this week is Nick Watney at 33-to-1.

This most certainly has plenty to do with the decline of Tiger Woods, whose entrance onto the world golf scene back in 1997 put an end to the last great era of international golf, an era that featured players like Nick Faldo, Greg Norman, Nick Price, Seve Ballesteros and many others.

In the intervening 14 years Woods, with help from Phil Mickelson and a few others, has dominated and the United States rode high.

Now they’ve hit a wall.

Over the course of professional golf history, of the 417 major championships played, Americans have won 253 of them. That’s a hefty .610 batting average. Right now, though, American golf is struggling at the highest levels.

International players have now won five consecutive major championships — the longest American drought ever — and 10 of the last 14.

This trend is also reflected in the World Golf Rankings, where the evidence suggests this isn’t some temporary anomaly. International players — Luke Donald, Lee Westwood, Martin Kaymer and Rory McIlroy — occupy the top four spots, but the quality runs extraordinarily deep. Non-Americans occupy 16 of the top 25 spots, 32 of the top 50, and 62 of the top 100.

Mickelson, the last American to win a major (the 2010 Masters) was asked if he could put his finger on what the problem was.

“Well, obviously we haven’t shot the lowest score,” he said, trying to make light of the question.

“I’m not worried about American golf. I think I’m more happy to see how strong international golf is. We’ve got players from all over the world winning the biggest events and I think that this only helps promote and grow the game of golf. It’s not as if we don’t have good young players coming up to represent America because we do.

“I remember when I first came on Tour and it was said there would never be another player to dominate the way Jack Nicklaus did and we all know that turned out not to be the case. You just don’t know what will happen.”

McIlroy, whose popular victory at the United States Open has been seen as something of a sea change in the balance of power in golf, is similarly skeptical. He has created a Tiger-like buzz on this side of the Atlantic and he accepts that, but he’s not counting out the Americans.

“I think these things go in cycles,” said McIlroy. “In the mid ’90s and into the early 2000’s, Tiger was winning and it seemed like every major was being won by an American player. They won the Ryder Cup in ’99. It seemed as if American golf was at its strongest.

“Now the Europeans have stepped up and started to play better. But there’s still a lot of good American golfers out there ... the likes of Rickie (Fowler), Dustin (Johnson), Bubba (Watson). Steve Stricker just won for the third year in a row at the John Deere. You’ve got Phil and hopefully Tiger can come back. American golf isn’t as badly off as everyone is making it out to be.”

Maybe, but if you start sorting through the Americans, other than Woods, who have won the British in the last 25 years, it’s something of an oddball group. Stewart Cink, Ben Curtis, Todd Hamilton, David Duval, Mark O’Meara, Justin Leonard, Tom Lehman, John Daly and Mark Calcavecchia. Some good, solid players there but hardly the creme de la creme.

But they’re major champions, one and all. And what America wouldn’t give for another one, oddball or not.

“The Europeans have given us a kick up the butt to step up,” Fowler said. “The Europeans are playing well right now, which doesn’t irritate us but does motivate us. It’s a good rivalry between us. We don’t hate them, we just want to beat them.”