If a misfiring Sergio Garcia is the “heartbeat of the team”, according to European Ryder Cup captain Thomas Bjorn, then we’d better hope there’s a defibrillator in the locker room.
The official announcement yesterday that Bjorn had opted for Garcia, Henrik Stenson, Ian Poulter and Paul Casey as his four captain’s picks was hardly a revelation. Not so much wild cards, more mild cards.
With an average age of just under 41, this particular quartet is a veritable dad’s army. Some critics will suggest it’s just another old boys network too as Bjorn sticks to the tried and trusted. They could be done and dusted as far as Ryder Cup careers go but we’ll only know that when it’s all over in Paris.
While justifiable candidates like Rafa-Cabrera Bello and Thomas Pieters, who both sparkled on their debuts in 2016, and Matt Wallace, a three-time European Tour winner in 2018, are left peering on from the outside and can all feel rightly aggrieved, the safe hands of experience, with their laurels of past glories, will get another crack at it.
In some respects, the message it delivers to the true European Tour campaigners is hardly encouraging. Wallace’s efforts garnered him plenty of wild card backing, particularly among the sturdy rank-and-file of the tour.
Plenty suggested this Ryder Cup was too soon for him but when you’re winning and you’re confident, you probably feel like you can take on the best in the world. In this furiously fickle, unpredictable game, Wallace may never have another season like this. Let’s hope he does, though, and the Ryder Cup chance does not pass him by.
As we all know, Garcia’s form has just about flat-lined since March but if his results have not got hearts racing then Bjorn hopes the Spaniard’s unbridled passion, pride and swashbuckling pedigree gets those European hearts beating.
It’s the kind of gamble that would draw gasps from the croupier in a Vegas casino but Bjorn has revealed his cards and now it’s up the players to justify their choice and repay this faith.
Garcia, more than most, has a point to prove. And Bjorn clearly believes the 38-year-old can prove those doubters wrong. “You have to look at Sergio in certain ways, he is the heartbeat of the team,” said the Dane.
“It’s like a football team going without their captain. He makes everybody around him better. He is everything that the European Ryder Cup team is about.”
Something of a talismanic figure during his eight previous cup appearances, Garcia, for those who like stats, averaged 3.75 points in his first four Ryder Cups.
In his last four, however, it’s down to 1.88 and having missed the cut in his last five majors as well as making early exits from seven of his last 12 tour events, Garcia needs to cling to that old adage that form is temporary, class is permanent.
The Ryder Cup, with its unique atmosphere, pressure and unforgiving scrutiny, is a hellishly difficult place to suddenly find some form. It may inspire him but it could quite easily inhibit him too.
Bjorn himself has always maintained that the Ryder Cup is not the environment for a player short of confidence. Like a bold approach shot, he’s looking for a risk and reward with this pick.
“I’m sure it wasn’t an easy decision, but he knows what I bring to the team,” said Garcia. “Everyone knows how much I love the Ryder Cup and I’m going to give everything I have.”
Poulter, with 12 wins in 18 cup matches, was never really a doubt. If he gets it going, his chest-pounding, rollicking histrionics will probably have the chandeliers shaking in the Palace of Versailles while Casey is back in the team for the first time in a decade after ending his self-imposed European exile.
Stenson, the 2016 Open champion who has been hampered by injury this year, got the nod for a fifth cup contest.
“There were a couple of disappointed people on the phone yesterday, and those were tough calls to make,” added Bjorn of those who missed out.
Now we wait to see if Bjorn has made the right calls ...
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