List grows for Ryder captain vacancy

IT MAY be very much the silly season where major golf is concerned but one subject keeps cropping up.

The Ryder Cup, it seems, is never far from some peoples minds. On the same day late last week, two reports came out on the wires one indicating that a battle for the 2006 captaincy lay in wait between Nick Faldo and Colin Montgomerie and the other clearly suggesting that the means of selecting the European team will be altered in time for the 2004 renewal at Oakland Hills, Michigan.

The captaincy issue is certain to remain a hot potato for several years to come. Jockeying for the position at Oakland Hills had been going on even before the last putt was holed at The Belfry in September and won't be resolved between Ian Woosnam and, probably, Bernhard Langer until the week of the Volvo PGA Championship next May, while several hats are already in the ring for The K-Club in 2006.

Because the matches are in this country in '06 and no Irishman has yet been handed the honour in spite of our outstanding record in the Ryder Cup, there is a heartfelt belief here that any one of Des Smyth, Christy O'Connor Junior and Eamonn Darcy should be given the job.

All have excellent credentials. Smyth is closing in on his 50th birthday but retains membership of the Tour until the end of the 2003 season. Only recently, he led the way at the US Champions Tour School which almost certainly means that his career will still be flourishing when 2006 comes around. Des played in the matches in 1979 and '81.

O'Connor and Darcy can hardly boast Smyth's current high status in the game but they carry deeply impressive track records for all that, not least the fact that Eamonn in 1987 and Christy two years later played key roles in the European Ryder Cup successes at Muirfield Village and The Belfry respectively. Both are now plying their trade in the senior ranks in Europe and the United States.

Personally, I'm at a loss to see why Langer, especially after his heroics in September, is hankering after a non-playing role in '04. It could well happen, of course, that he will have second thoughts and wait for another two years, thus lengthening the queue still further for The K-Club. Montgomerie is clearly watching things closely and was in all probability attempting to drive a dagger into the aspirations of the three Irishmen with some of his recent comments.

"I would be prepared to forego my place in order to lead the team while still an active player on the world circuit," he declared. "The powers that be have that on the record. It depends what is happening with Langer, Faldo and Woosnam but I feel it's important to captain the team when you are playing on the Tour as a player so you can relate to the players in the team as Sam (Torrance) did to the rookies and the experienced players alike."

Colin Montgomerie will be 44 come September 2006. Bernhard Langer was 45 when he starred alongside Monty last September. What's his hurry? I say, lay off Monty, your turn will come you will still be too valuable as a player in '06!

Two contentious decisions remain to be made about the captaincy. A lot of discussion also remains before the best formula is arrived at for picking the next European team. However, it already seems more or less accepted that the present system of taking the top ten off the European Tour order of merit and affording the captain two "wild cards" is already a thing of the past. Even Ken Scholfield, whose job as executive director of the Tour means that he must protect the best interests of his tournament sponsors whenever possible, accepts that the best road open to the Ryder Cup committee is to opt for the top five Europeans on the world rankings and the top five on the European order of merit along with the two usual wild cards. Even though Europe won five of the last nine matches and tied another, change is desirable because more and more of our younger players will be concentrating their energies on the US circuit and as a consequence may not be in a position to pick up enough points from their activities back home.

"That's why there will be no third or four wild card. We just want the right system in order to pick our strongest team and I reject any suggestion that we'll use qualification for the team as a lever to force any of our players to compete more in Europe."