1. Only criticism is playing Harrington in all matches. He is 0-3-1. At 0-2-1, time to rest him and play Karlsson or Clarke.
Lehman. He's better than Sutton, but about the same as Kite and Wadkins. Here's my take...
1. Not playing Verplank in alternate shot Sat.
2. Playing DiMarco and Mickelson Sat. morning, though they were 0-1-1 Friday.
3. With the success of Johnson/Verplank, substituting Cink for Verplank through Verplank played poorly. Cink needs rest time anyways, since he is 0-2 in singles play.
These guys look uninspired out there. I don't see any spark outside of maybe a few players. Europe wants this thing. You can see it in their play. USA....I just don't get that sense of urgency. And that falls back on the captain. Maybe we should bring back more of a veteran, like a Watson or a Crenshaw.
Guys we've had as captain's picks lately haven't had the most Ryder Cup experience, and when i say experience, i mean at least 5 or 6 Cups, like a Watson, a Woosnam, a Langer, a Ballesteros. Because most likely in '08 we're going to have to go up against an even stronger team and Faldo as captain.
I was'nt a Woosie fan prior to the match but he has done nothing wrong since play started. Possibly Clarke could have played one of the foursomes, but at 10-6 up thats just being picky. The strength in depth of the team all the way down has been so impressive that Woosie hasnt really had to get too involved & definitely seems to get on well with the players.
As for Lehman, comes across much better in interviews etc but has lacked imagination and adaptability in his pairings. Persevering with Mickelson/Di Marco was a mistake and even playing Woods & Furyk in all 4 games didnt yield a great return overall. I think he should have split them up today in search of four points instead of two (& they only got the one point today between them anyway).
Lehman did okay ! He`s a classy captain, and he managed to get his team to attend a practise day in Ireland, which was something that would would have been unheard of only a few years ago! I hope he doesn`t get grilled by the American press! Ironically, I think he would have scored more points than most of his team if he had been playing! Although, I didn`t agree with Lehman`s views on Mickelson! Phil looked to be struggling physically coping with playing 36 holes.
You can actually be a good captain and not win the Ryder Cup ! ...however, I suspect a losing captain is not allowed a second chance in America. Whereas Bernard Gallacher who was a good captain, was allowed more than one attempt to win the Ryder Cup.
I think Lehman deserves a second chance...but thesedays the job might be considered too draining to take on twice in a row! Woosnam certainly wouldn`t do it again!
I don't know if Lehman did a bad job or not, but I think he just got out-manuevered by Woosnam. If I knew the process of how they decide who plays when and at what point the other captain knows, do they work it out together, etc. I could make a more informed post.
If someone knows the matching-up process and would mind explaining it, I'd appreciate it. Does one captain make out his line-up for the next day, and then the other captain chooses who he wants to play? Or do they both have slots to fill, try to guess what the other guy is doing, and then fill in accordingly? Once a line-up is presented, is it etched in stone, or can changes be made?
Other than sticking with Phil & DiMarco too long, I thought Lehman did fine. How was he to know that that Johnson & Henry would play as well as they did. He went with his big guns. Nothing he could have done would have changed the outcome.... perhaps a couple of points, but that's it.
Lehman did a good job . He had limited options and when his best strategy did not work ,he had no plan B available. Woosie's biggest problem was who to leave out ,Lehman could not find 8 players to do a job. In the mornings, Woosie had Donald and Howell walking around unemployed, in the afternoons it was Clarke and Oli. Lehman had Taylor ,Wetterich and Verplank. The match as 12 against 4.
I don't know if Lehman did a bad job or not, but I think he just got out-manuevered by Woosnam. If I knew the process of how they decide who plays when and at what point the other captain knows, do they work it out together, etc. I could make a more informed post.
If someone knows the matching-up process and would mind explaining it, I'd appreciate it. Does one captain make out his line-up for the next day, and then the other captain chooses who he wants to play? Or do they both have slots to fill, try to guess what the other guy is doing, and then fill in accordingly? Once a line-up is presented, is it etched in stone, or can changes be made?
What SHOULD happen is that each captain lists his playing order independently and then hands them in to the officials without knowing the other side's line-up.
In the past, however, it has been known for agreements to be made that certain players would play one another. Brian Barnes v Jack Nicklaus in the second singles of the day was "fixed" between Byron Nelson and Bernard Hunt, because Jack wanted revenge for his morning defeat. He didn't get it, of course.
I did wonder whether Monty v Toms and Donald v Campbell yesterday were arranged, as they were repeats of 2004.
Before anyone gives Lehman a hard time , you have to look at the team he had.
Apart from 4 rookies ,his core 8 players included
Chad Campbell - has played 11 tournaments since the Masters, with one top ten and 5 missed cuts.
Phil Mickleson - Since US Open , has played 5 tournaments with no top ten finishes
Chris Di MArco - Since World AMtchplay in MArch he has had one top ten finish and has missed 9 cuts.
Scott Verplank has had one top ten since the Masters and missed two cuts in last three
Tiger,Fuyrk, Toms and Cink had shown some form ,but he had four players woefully out of form and four rookies ,two of whom should have stayed at home. The lack of support put a heavy toll on Tiger and Furyk who must have felt they were fighting on their own. Because of the losing start and lack of form , Lehman could not split up Tiger and Furyk to help rookies the way Tiger helped Riley in the last match.
The Sow's ear could not be woven into anything other than another sow's ear.
As far as I know each Captain gives the Officials his Teams/Order of Play and these are then matched. But there is nothing to say the two Captains could discuss that certain players will be at 3 or 5 etc.
There was a free DVD with the Sunday Times yesterday. On it they showed Brian Barnes beating Jack twice in one day. Arnie was wonderful ,he told how the Americans wanted to bring Jack down to earth and he had a conversation with Bernard Hunt along the lines of, I know we are forbidden to tell one another where we are putting people, but JAck wants to play Brian again and I'm putting JAck at 3........
I wasn't too keen on Woosie but he got it right apart from letting Harrington play so much (although he came up against the form players most of the time). Lehman was fine but had little in the way of options. Mickelson was out of it and shouldn't have played so much but he stuck with Woods and he came good in the Saturday Foursomes and was great in the Singles (no real surprise there).
I hope Faldo can do as good a job in 2008 at Valhalla.
Harrington ahd 5 really sticky matches and was up against Tiger twice, Zach 'More birdies in his round than the rest of the US team' Johnson, Scott 'Ace' Verplank. In the Friday foursomes with McGinley he should have won but the uS birdies the last 3 holes