With Colin Montgomerie in top form, the experienced European team can wrest the Ryder Cup back from the United States
GOLF: Jon Swift
THE shift of power — or rather the power to win consistently in top company — from being a wholly owned subsidiary of Golf USA is perhaps nowhere better evidenced than in the growing importance of the Ryder Cup as an international competition.
It might be exclusive of a good proportion of the top 10 on the Sony world rankings — Greg Norman, Steve Elkington, Nick Price and Ernie Els claim a birthright which belongs neither to the Land of the Free nor the continent of Europe — as a competition devised all those years ago in 1927 by British businessman Samuel Ryder as a contest between the golfers of America and those of Great Britain.
But having expanded to include the whole spectrum of Europe’s players — at the personal, unsolicited advice of the great Jack Nicklaus in 1977 — it has become a global spectacle which will have millions glued to their television sets this weekend as a dozen Europeans attempt to wrest back the trophy they lost to the Americans four years ago.
The venue, fittingly, is one of the finest of the US Open courses, the Oak Hills Country Club’s lush and leafy layout at Rochester in upstate New York.
The layout should suit a European side not usually fazed by the progressive regeneration of an old course that leaves it with no discernible overall feel to it, but rather a collection of different themes and imprints of successive designers.
Yet, being close to New York City, the competition is sure to attract a good number of the rowdier ”you’re the man” type of followers in the galleries. They are, as former PGA tournament director Dennis Bruyns so succinctly put it, ”the yahoo element”. This will not be a quiet competition from behind the ropes along the fairways. American pride and the nation’s predilection for loud vocal encouragement assure this.
If noise is a factor in the play of any of the 24 down to tee it up, they are already down to their opponents in a psychological sense. But with venues like Rome and Madrid as whistle stops on the European tour, there is perhaps some built-in tolerance.
If you can manage to sleep in either European capital, noise will never again be a factor in your life. This, however, is surely not the overriding consideration when looking for a result.
And despite the misgivings of former European Ryder Cup captain Tony Jacklin, there is a positive feel to the side from the Old World. A feeling that as strong as the Americans may appear to be on paper, somehow the Europeans have it in them to relive the great wins of 1985 and again two years later.
Certainly the rotund Scot Colin Montgomerie must be the form player of the competition, prompting Seve Ballesteros to say that ”if Jose-Maria (Olazabal) isn’t playing, I want to be paired with Colin”.
It is high praise from the Spaniard and in his thinking lies the strength of the European contingent which crosses the Atlantic. Ballesteros has all the experience, all the guile and Ryder Cup knowhow. Montgomerie, unlike Seve, is there as the man to match.
It is a feeling which permeates the European side with Nick Faldo and Ian Woosnam hardened veterans, as indeed are Sam Torrance — playing some of the best golf of his life — Berhard Langer and Mark James.
Like Montgomerie the flamboyant Italian Costantino Rocca is a form player. There is, too, that touch of Latin flair, so amply evident at the 18th at St Andrews during the British Open, which Rocca brings with him as a 15th club in his bag.
It is the same sort of unexplainable exuberance which set Olazabal — sadly missing from this line-up — dancing in that classic victory of 1987. It is a dimension to the game which the serious minds of the Americans cannot fully comprehend, yet one as important as any trophy to the game itself.
This is not to discount the contributions the American sides have made to this unique team competition. For, in a money-driven society and a tour which counts greatness in pure dollar terms, they always play with the patriotic fire of the Boston Tea Party still burning bright within their chests.
In this they are not alone. Over the past 15 years the Europeans have shown the type of pride which has been engendeered by the general feeling that the tour on their side of the Atlantic is in some manner inferior to the one played in America.
This, in virtually every sense but monetary, has been proved incorrect. And it must be remembered that the honour of playing in the Ryder Cup is the driving force. There is — in comparison to the regular tour events — simply no money on offer.
There is, for once, the purer instinct which bred man’s desire to compete as the spark which has seen the competition smoulder in the background for many years before igniting into a blaze which is clearly seen across the globe.
The pride of the Europeans is not to be discounted.
For while the likes of Corey Pavin, Tom Lehman, Davis Love III and the left-handed Phil Mickelson are indeed fine players and doubtless deeply imbued with the allegiance to the Stars and Stripes the occasion demands, there seems to be an almost ethereal feel to the substance of the American team.
It is perhaps a foolish observation, especially given the calibre of the individual members of the American line-up, and given that veteran Curtis Strange won the US Open on the same layout in 1989 and is a potentially inspired wild card by captain Lanny Wadkins.
But one must remember that it was Woosnam who chased Strange home that year, missing that particular brand of immortality by a single shot. In short, the blend of experience and youth, form and familiarity with tight situations would tend to favour the Europeans. There are too many of them who have been there before.
United States: Corey Pavin, Tom Lehman, Davis Love III, Phil Mickelson, Jay Haas, Loren Roberts, Ben Crenshaw, Peter Jacobsen, Jeff Maggert, Brad Faxon, Curtis Strange, Fred Couples. Captain: Lanny Wadkins
Europe: Bernhard Langer, Sam Torrance, Seve Ballesteros, Constantino Rocca, Colin Montgomerie, David Gilford, Per-Ulrick Johansson, Nick Faldo, Ian Woosnam, Mark James, Philip Walton, Darren Clarke. Captain: Bernard Gallagher