These are the boxes a winning Ryder Cup captain must tick

This week the game of golf lost one of its truly global icons with the passing of the great Arnold Palmer. Although not the greatest golfer ever, the charismatic Palmer can take great credit for expanding the popularity of the game beyond its then traditional boundaries by continuously supporting the likes of the Open Championship at a time when Europe only had a fledgling tour.

As a founding investor in the Golf Channel, Palmer took great satisfaction from the fact golf is now a truly global game, so it is perhaps only fitting that the country of his birth, this week also gets to host golf’s greatest showpiece, the Ryder Cup.

Its popularity and success lies in its global appeal - the classic storyline of “David” (the European Tour) pitting itself against “Goliath” (the all-powerful PGA Tour) and while is nearly always a close contest with momentum shifting by the day the fact Europe has won eight of the past 10 Ryder Cups, means Team USA heads into tomorrow’s opening jousts under unprecedented pressure to win.