McGinley left nothing to chance

Paul McGinley left nothing to chance in his masterplan to retain the Ryder Cup for Europe. It was an attention to detail that one journalist suggested was borderline "disturbing" but it got the required outcome.

From the blue and gold fish in a team room decked out with inspirational quotes and imagery of European icons past to appointing an extra vice-captain to look after the four players required to sit out each of the four sessions over the first two days of competition, McGinley had thought of everything, leaving no stone unturned, no idea unexplored, during his 19-month lead-in to the showdown at Gleneagles.

It was an approach borne of the Alex Ferguson school of management, one which first begat Roy Keane’s fail to prepare, prepare to fail ethos and has had a new disciple from the moment McGinley was appointed captain, leading one to imagine just what the Irishman would have thought of Corey Pavin and his leaky rainsuits at Celtic Manor in 2010.