Boost for Monty with European strength

COREY Pavin, the US Ryder Cup team captain, must be wondering what’s going on these days.

Week in, week out, members of the opposing European side are contesting the closing stages of many of the biggest tournaments on the US PGA Tour and frequently winning them or even fighting it out among themselves for the top honour. There was a classic example of this in February when Ian Poulter defeated Paul Casey in the final of the WGC-Accenture World Match Play Championship in Arizona.

Over the last weekend, the St Jude Classic in Memphis, Tennessee, boiled down to another head-to-head between Lee Westwood and Robert Karlsson. Westwood, the game’s third ranked player, got home at the fourth extra hole. It could, of course, be fairly argued that it should never have reached this stage given that the unheralded Robert Garrigus had the tournament in the bag until taking a triple bogey seven at the 18th, the fact remains that not a single potential member of the American team was in any way involved in the closing stages.