Darren Clarke: Europe can handle Hazeltine Ryder Cup pressure

Ryder Cup captain Darren Clarke is confident his players will be able to handle the partisan atmosphere when Europe defend the trophy against a USA team which will be “baying for blood”.

Clarke expects a positive atmosphere at Hazeltine next year, despite two of his prospective team — Sergio Garcia and Ian Poulter — recently being heckled at the Players Championship at Sawgrass.

Speaking after announcing there would be no changes to the Ryder Cup qualifying system, Clarke said: “It’s always part and parcel. Home advantage is huge and it’s part and parcel of the Ryder Cup. But I think the likes of Sergio or Poults have been on the tour too long to let something like that affect them.”

Clarke has decided to keep the same format used to determine the team for Gleneagles in 2014. That means nine players will qualify automatically, with the first four coming from the European points list — based on points gained in European Tour events — and five from the world points list — based on world ranking points gained globally — with Clarke then selecting three wild cards.

“I gave it a lot of thought,” Clarke said yesterday. “But my feeling was with the team Paul (McGinley) assembled at Gleneagles and how successful they were, it would have been very foolish to make any changes.”