Is this good enough?
Message newly-crowned Open champ Molinari sent skipper Bjorn to reassure him he was in good shape for Paris ... EUAN McLEAN IN PARIS
THOMAS BJORN was worried. Three months to the Ryder Cup and a key player he wanted on his team, Francesco Molinari, has just made a call he feared would compromise his chances of getting there.
Opting to skip the Scottish Open at Gullane – with its big prize fund and vital links golf practice it offers ahead of The Open the following week – seemed a crazy decision for anyone striving to be part of his team.
But there and then Molinari made a vow he would do what it takes to get on his team, that he had everything under control. And didn’t he just.
Within a fortnight as Bjorn watched TV pictures of the Italian lifting the Claret Jug after bettering a charging Tiger Woods in the final round of The Open at Carnoustie he felt a text beep on the phone in his pocket … “Is this good enough?” It was and Molinari has been more than good enough since as the star of the European team that took down a strongly fancied American side at Le Golf National.
With five points from five matches the 35-year-old is the only European Ryder Cupper to sweep a maximum haul for his side.
With his pinpoint accuracy tailormade for plotting his way around this demanding course flanked by thick rough and water hazards lurking at every turn Molinari was a deadly efficient operator for Bjorn.
Which is why the captain had been so nervous at the thought of his scheduling depriving Bjorn of one of the key weapons in his arsenal. The Dane said: “When he went to the John Deere Classic the week before The Open I was a bit like, ‘Is this the right move?’
“I spoke to him about it but he said, ‘Well, I have to do this for how my year’s planning out’. But I said to him I’m a little bit worried about it because I really wanted him to be on this team.
“I really did because I thought this course suited him perfectly. For me he would be a perfect foursomes opportunity on this golf course and I had that conversation with him.
“But he still said, ‘For me I have to do this but I promise you I will make the team’. I got a message on the Sunday night after The Open saying, ‘Is this good enough?’ He’s just gone from strength to strength since then.
“With the quality he has, he’s such an under-rated player and has been for a long time. Now he’s got the confidence he can do anything from here. He showed that this week, he’s phenomenal.
“He took on the best players in the world and showed he is one of the best players in the world too. He’s equal to the task.”
With Molinari in such red-hot form and relishing a dream-team partnership with pal Tommy Fleetwood it would have been no surprise to see him placed at the top of the team order in the Sunday singles.
But Bjorn had other plans, tucking him further down the pack to a place where he would likely be in a position to hole the winning putt.
And again – testament to understated
but thorough preparation Bjorn applied to his captaincy – he had something special for the back markers to ensure any one of them would be ready for the pressure to do just that.
He added: “I prepared for a final day that was really tight and when it’s tight, it comes down to those singles between 9 and 12.
“I was thinking, ‘How do I get that mentalilty across to those guys’.
“I stood on that first tee and experienced how great the atmosphere was when Rory teed off first – everybody is on the first and the second holes but as the day goes on it empties out. By the time Alex (Noren) teed off last it’s a pretty lonely place, coffee cups floating around, like it’s the day after.
“That’s a difficult place to be so how do I get that message across to them that what they’re doing is still important?
“Well, I made four videos. There’s one with Paul McGinley from 2002, one with Monty from 1997, one of Martin Kaymer from 2012 and then one with Graeme McDowell from 2010 when they were in those later singles matches.
“They told the story to camera about what they experienced, how it came down to their matches, to give them an idea it might happen to them too.
“So they were prepared in their heads. Sometimes pictures are better than words. I don’t know if it had any impact but it certainly had an idea.”
As it turned out it was Molinari’s match that took Europe to the magic 14.5 point mark but he didn’t have to hole any putt to do it with Phil Mickelson conceding on the 16th tee having just dunked his ball in the water.
The rest, typically, battled on before Noren drained a brilliant birdie putt on the last to finish a tremendous 17.5 to 10.5 win with a flourish.
Reflecting on it all yesterday, with that precious little gold cup perched at his feet, Bjorn was asked to pick out the best decision of his captaincy.
Without hesitation he said: “My picks. They delivered. That was not down to me of course.
“It was down to them. They wanted to deliver. I was under pressure when I made them but I’d put plans together and that’s so much easier when you know them so well. “I could make plans with them and know how they work, what they do, what makes them tick, what makes them do the right things coming into it.” And with a combined haul of 9.5 points between them they certainly did the right things while they were on site too. Final, conclusive proof of a job well and thoroughly done by a captain who deserves far more credit than he’ll ever allow himself to take.