Harrington got off lightly after Ryder flop
SHOOTING the messenger feels not only instinctive but also defensible when the courier is Colin Montgomerie.
But Monty’s strident criticism of the Ryder Cup team led by Padraig Harrington is not easily discounted. What it points up is both the elevated status that Harrington enjoys in this country – and how that position has protected him from criticism.
It also resurrects an uncomfortable fact: either the Ryder Cup matters or it doesn’t. When he was chosen to captain the European side, Harrington’s achievement was widely celebrated, and the profile of Irish golf climbed another notch.
This mattered.
Then Europe got hosed over a weekend in Wisconsin, eventually losing by 10 points, and the Ryder Cup didn’t seem to matter so much.
That Harrington walked away from the wreckage of that competition with his reputation virtually untouched here shows just where the Ryder Cup registers in the concerns of the Irish public. The golfing aficionados may be hooked on it, but it’s reasonable to assume that the fleeting support had found other ways to entertain themselves as the US procession took place on the Sunday of last year’s edition.
Those now rolling their eyes at Montgomerie can be forgiven on the basis that he seems a bit of a pain but his analysis, while cutting, was fair.
Harrington’s captaincy failed – but most people barely seemed to notice.