SIR Nick Faldo today dismissed Phil Mickelson's scathing criticism of United States captain Tom Watson after their crushing Ryder Cup defeat.

The five-time Major champion stunned the golf world in the aftermath of Europe's emphatic 16.5 - 11.5 victory at Gleneagles on Sunday night.

The left-hander called for a return to the team set-up that Paul Azinger had adopted so successfully in the competition at Valhalla back in 2008.

Azinger split his 12-man side into three US Navy Seals-style "pods" - then looked on as they romped to a memorable five point triumph.

The comments of Mickelson, who was left out of both sessions on Saturday, were an astonishing public attack on golf great Watson.

But Faldo, losing skipper six years ago, reckons the structure of the visiting side had nothing whatsoever to do with their abject failure in Perthshire.

The CBS commentator reckoned the result came down to the high quality of Paul McGinley's side's play over the PGA Centenary course.

"I work for American television now and they love their stats," said the record points scorer in the history of the biennial event.

"The bottom line is that if your top three players perform really well and win their lion's share of their points you win. It is a simple as that.

"That's happened for Europe in the last few Ryder Cups. My own stats for this year's event show Europe were 110-under-par and the USA team were 78-under-par for all of the matches added up. That is a huge difference. On the golf course, we outplayed them.

"Off the golf course, they can talk about their plans and preparation and everything. And the captain certainly wants to make his players feel good when they go out.

"But once you send the players out there to play it is down to the golf. And with the conditions the way they were, our guys just looked stronger, as simple as that."

Sir Nick became embroiled in a slanging match with European talisman Sergio Garcia at the Ryder Cup last week - after branding him "useless" and accusing him of having "a bad attitude" during his disastrous stint as captain.

Yet, the Englishman still felt that Mickelson, who has been on the losing side eight times in his record 10 appearances in the Ryder Cup, was out of order to criticise Watson.

Faldo told the Californian golfer he should have made his controversial comments in the privacy of the team room instead of in front of the world's media.

"At least my lot waited a couple of years!" he said. "For him to sit there and just throw the captain under the bus like that was a tough one. I don't think that was the right place to do it. That should have been a private conversation."

Faldo added: "Obviously, there was a little bit of aggro in the American team room.

"When you talk about poor communication and wanting to go out and not knowing whether you were going to play is important stuff.

"Players want to know when they are going to play. That is what Paul McGinley did so well with his European team.

"A good example was Graeme McDowell and Victor Dubuisson. He knew what he wanted to do with those guys.

"He told them: 'Right, you're going to be the masters of that format'. There was no screaming and shouting from them saying they should have been playing in the fourball.

"They came there with a purpose. It was a long, hard, physical week and he got his selections spot on."