RYDER CUP
After all the talk, now comes the time when the Task Force is taken to task.
The stakes have rarely been higher for the USA Ryder Cup team as they seek to turn around a record of perennial underachievement stretching back two decades.
Two wins in the last 10 Ryder Cups is a stain on the reputation of a nation that used to rule the golfing world.
When Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson were spanking the GB& I teams of old, they’d surely never have imagined the day when the boot would be on the other foot.
But Watson himself was to feel that boot up his backside two years ago as a third successive loss led to a public mutiny against his captaincy and ultimately the crisis talks of that hastily-assembled task force.
For make no mistake, that is what it has become for Team USA – a crisis.
Another defeat this time next week and it will be a full-blown disaster. Humiliation. If they lose this one Europe will be as well giving them strokes next time in France.
On a stage where the atmosphere is so notoriously intense that even multiple Major winners struggle to hold a club in their trembling hands, the pressure will never weigh more heavily on American shoulders.
That they are also tagged as favourites does them no favours.
Yet as much as this 41st edition is fast shaping up as something of a free shot for Europe, Darren Clarke wi l l see ominous signs in the circumstances that have focused American minds more than ever.
For judging by the noises coming from within the American camp, they’ve finally learned something that for so long appeared to be Europe’s secret weapon – passion.
Take Jordan Spieth, for instance. Just last week the former Masters and US Open champion was asked where he values the Ryder Cup in compar ison to the obscene $10million prize he claimed for winning the FedEx 12 months before.
Spieth, who played at Gleneagles in 2014, said: “If you say I have a choice, it’s the Ryder Cup. You want something that you don’t have. It’s a trophy I’ve watched the other side have and it hurt.
“When we boarded the plane home, we were empty. We don’t want that again. We want celebration. We want champagne falling off the balcony.
“And I’ m pr e t t y confident about how we’re going to go about our business. I think we have a fantastic team this year, one of the best teams I can remember looking back.”
Compare that to Tiger Woods at the peak of his powers in 2002 when he was asked a simi lar question before a WGC event at Mount Juliet in Ireland. Woods said he could “think of a million reasons” why he would rather win the solo tournament and so it proved – he won the big cheque then watched Europe partying at The Belfry the following week.
Even Woods would probably look back on that comment and squirm, especially now he has taken on the role of assistant captain – and by all a c c ou nt s done so with wholehearted commitment.
I f Tiger has got w ith the programme and embraced the importance of his team binding together to win this one, that alone should set alarm bells ringing for Clarke’s backroom.
Phi l Mickel son’s outburst two years ago – using the post-event press conference to accuse captain Watson of ignoring the players’ will and not involving them in decisions – has sparked a cultural shift that has forced the USA set- up to re- examine everything.
In 2014 Lefty called for a return to the “pod system” – which breaks the team into smal l pra c t ic e g roups – successful ly employed by Paul Azinger at Valhalla in 2008.
It’s significant then that current captain Davis Love III is the man who leaned most heavily on Azinger for advice when he was denied glory at Medinah in 2012 by Europe’s miraculous comeback on the final