McGinley's golfing gods are in green

As past tournaments have proved, The Ryder Cup seems to bring out something special in Irish golfers, writes Charlie Mulqueen, Oakland Hills.

BERNHARD Langer has the job on paper and will perform it outstandingly well but Paul McGinley describes Colin Montgomerie as Europe's 'unofficial' playing captain at Oakland Hills today. "If this was a football team, Monty would be the captain, let me put it that way."

McGinley earned his Ryder Cup spurs at The Belfry two years ago when he gained a new found admiration for Montgomerie.

"He's got the respect of the players, he's clever and intelligent and above all, he's not afraid of the Americans," said McGinley.

"That comes across quite clearly. He's not afraid of the Ryder Cup. He's not afraid of going head to head. In my view, he produced one of the greatest performances in golf history on the last day, two years ago. There was colossal responsibility on him. He was playing number one against Scott Hoch and was expected to beat him. If he hadn't set the tone, it would have been very difficult for the rest. But he created such a surge of energy. And then there was his calmness in the team room. No panic. He spoke with actions rather than words."

McGinley loves the idea of the Europeans being the underdogs. He stresses the European camp is confident they can upset the odds once again - even allowing for the way the course has been set up by US captain Hal Sutton.

Oakland Hills is one of the most respected lay-outs in all of America - and that's the point. It's in America, it's their chosen venue for the Ryder Cup and they can set it up any way they like.

"The one big factor in this Ryder Cup is going to be the set-up of the course," he said. "We have to address the poor performance of the Europeans on US Open-style courses over the years. The Americans play these kind of brutal courses three or four times a year. We have nothing like that in Europe. Sutton is no clown. He knows how to set up a golf course to suit his team and, if I was in his, shoes I would do exactly the same."

Nevertheless, McGinley won't be a bit surprised if yet another Irishman plays a key part in a European victory. The 37-year-old Dubliner has always believed in destiny, the golfing gods and their role where the Ryder Cup and Irish golfers are concerned.

He points to the parts played in previous matches by Eamonn Darcy, Christy O'Connor Junior and Philip Walton. He himself came along in 2002 and sank the winning putt at The Belfry. McGinley, Darren Clarke and Padraig Harrington provide a powerful Irish axis once again at Oakland Hills, so the prospects for another big Irish story are bright in the extreme.

"The funny thing is that Darce, Junior and Philip, all three of them, were desperately unlucky to miss out on a team at different times," he said. "Darce came 57 points short. Can you imagine that? Knowing what I know from my own personal experiences, I can only imagine what he went through, being bumped out of the team and then not getting a pick. That's something I was aware of in the final qualifier - the golfing gods had bestowed a great favour on me in 2002. Were they going to take it away now by finishing 11th and not getting a pick?

"The main thing is the buzz I get out of being part of a team, whether it's Dunhill Cups, World Cups, the Irish amateur team, the Grange Senior Cup squad, right back to my footballing days. I get a real buzz out of being part of a team, the responsibility of being part of a team all pulling in the same direction. And it's not the fact that I holed the winning putt, the fact that we won, it was the bonding and camaraderie that I enjoyed that week.

"We're all buddies in the European team. When [Ian] Poulter made it, I sent a message of congratulations on my mobile phone. I don't know if that happens with the Americans. I get the feeling there's a lot more competition between them as individuals. The American Tour is a lonely tour. It's not the glamour tour it's made out to be over here on television. You make your own craic. It would be nothing unusual to come down for breakfast and see two or three of them sitting at different tables. I would join a Danish guy, a Swedish guy, I'd never sit on my own. That's what the two tours are like and there's nothing to suggest the two teams won't be a little similar."

As part of his strategy to get into the side, Paul convinced himself it was a ten man team - "a mental trick I was playing on myself" - and likened his tactics to the way he handled the situation when he and Jim Furyk arrived on the 18th green at The Belfry two years ago all square and with the destination of the trophy resting on the outcome. Paul was eight or nine feet from the hole in three with the American about 16ins away after a fabulous bunker shot. Europe needed a half point to clinch the trophy.

"Jim had a downhill putt and 99 times out of a hundred, he was going to make it," he said. "It was Paraic O'Rourke, a three times South of Ireland champion, a friend of my dad's and somebody I learned an awful lot from, who would often give a guy a two foot putt if he himself had a six footer. I looked at Furyk's putt and thought, it is missable. Then I looked at mine and thought, no, I'll clear the decks, everything out of the way. I'm either going to do it or not and that was the same principle I brought into making the team this time."

GIVEN the tortuous nature of Ryder Cup combat, I often wonder why there are some like McGinley who can't get enough of it and others who don't know if they could ever face it again. Philip Walton after 1995 was a classic example of the latter. So does Paul really understand the excruciating torture?

"That has been the appeal to me, to play an away game" he said. "Padraig and I won the World Cup in Kiawah Island against an American team that included Davis Love, who lives just up the road. Doing it away from home was a big deal. In a perverse way, I want to go into the lion's den. It's going to be hostile. It's going to be intimidating. I'm under no illusions that things turned out whiter than white for me, the last time. There's going to be a different slant and I'm ready for that."

Each member of the European team is facing into the week with a different approach. McGinley sees a lot of characters and many will be surprised that he singled out the supposedly gruff Spaniard, Miguel-Angel Jimenez, as one. At a recent team meeting, Jimenez was asked if he had any special requirements on the week of the match. He replied: "Si, three things: one, I want a good Rioja wine; two, I want the best cigars and three, I want espresso coffee because the coffee in America is shit."

Jimenez, McGinley, the lot of them, will have to accustom themselves to an unprecedented level of hostility in Detroit. Paul himself hasn't experienced hostility from American crowds but has been warned by Jesper Parnevik - "whom I learned most from, the last time" - to be ready for some serious stuff in Detroit.

"One of Jesper's best friends is an ice hockey player and he was caddying for him in Akron. We were talking about different cities in America and Parnevik was claiming this Ryder Cup could never be as tough as Boston. But the ice hockey guy insisted he had played in every city in the States and that Detroit was the toughest he ever played in. It's a blue collar city. You've got all the car manufacturers there, Ford, Chrysler, full of factory workers who love their sport and like to be boisterous. He told me to be prepared, because it was the rowdiest place he had ever played."