Louth's Grehan can provide early lift for home fans in Lahinch

With the prestigious amateur team matchplay event returning to these shores for the first time since 2007, a sold-out crowd of 8,000 spectators per day get to see this year’s British Amateur champion Grehan partner England’s Eliot Baker.

Stuart Grehan of Team GB&I prior to the Walker Cup. Pic: Oisin Keniry/R&A/R&A via Getty Images)

Home fans looking for an early lift on the first morning of the Walker Cup will have Ireland’s lone representative on the GB&I team to face the Americans at Lahinch with Co. Louth’s Stuart Grehan off in the first foursomes match at 8:30am on Saturday.

With the prestigious amateur team matchplay event returning to these shores for the first time since 2007, when Rory McIlroy and Jonathan Caldwell flew the flag for Irish golf at Royal Co Down, a sold-out crowd of 8,000 spectators per day get to see this year’s British Amateur champion Grehan partner England’s Eliot Baker.

They will welcome a rematch against the USA pairing of Preston Stout and Ethan Fang, now the numbers one and nine in the World Amateur Golf Rankings, having beaten that partnership 1 up in the corresponding session 12 months ago at Cypress Point.

GB&I captain Dean Robertson is also sending out a tried and tested partnership second at 8:40am with Tyler Weaver, world number two, and Scottish teenager Connor Graham, embarking on his third Walker Cup appearance, reuniting from last year to face Jay Leng Jr and Kihei Akina. 

Weaver and Graham split the points across two duels with the then top-ranked American pairing of Jackson Koivun and Tommy Morrison, winning a match apiece over the weekend. 

Koivun, then world number one, has since turned pro, winning his third PGA Tour start in the touring ranks at the John Deere Classic in July.

American prodigy Mile Russell, the 17-year-old world number four, partners Tyler Watts in the 8:50am match against GB&I’s Luke Poulter, the son of European Ryder Cup hero Ian Poulter, and fellow Englishman Sam Easterbrook while the final foursomes match gets underway at 9am between GB&I’s Niall Sheils Donegan of Scotland and England’s Josh Hill and USA pair Josiah Gilbert and Ryder Cowan.

The session is followed by eight singles matches with Sunday’s schedule featuring another four foursomes matches followed by 10 singles matches in the afternoon.

Speaking during their Thursday press conference, GB&I duo Weaver and Graham both referenced the long build-up to get to Saturday morning’s opening fourballs session and the strategies of managing stamina and focus to hit the ground running on the first tee.

For Weaver there is the added frustration of dealing with an oblique injury that has kept the 21-year-old Englishman sidelined this summer. 

Now fit and ready to play all four sessions this weekend, Weaver yesterday said: “Keeping the energy levels is important. Obviously it's a long week. We've just been playing a lot of golf, having a lot of fun, a lot of matches out there to get the competitive juices flowing. We feel ready.

“We felt ready the whole week. Today in the wind, we didn't feel like we needed to do too much just because we felt so prepared going into today. Today was just to get everything ready, and then go time tomorrow.

Graham is equally set for his third Walker Cup appearance. Though still a teenager at 19, he has learned the value of managing two sessions of high-level competitive golf per day.

“I think it's a long buildup, so when you're getting done in the morning, putting your feet up in the afternoons is very important,” Graham said. “We've got a good nutritionist in this week that's making sure we're eating and drinking right, which is also huge come the weekend to make sure our energies are on point for the afternoon.” 

Points are the object of the exercise with defending champions USA needing 13 to retain their crown for a sixth meeting in a row, while GB&I need 13.5 for their first Walker Cup since 2015.