Graeme McDowell Hints At Friday Pairings
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The first significant clues to Europe’s Friday Foursome pairings were given by Graeme McDowell during his Tuesday press conference.
Captain Jose-Maria Olazabal had teamed Luke Donald and Lee Westwood against Ian Poulter and Justin Rose during the day’s practise round. While Northern Irish duo Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell played Paul Lawrie and Sergio Garcia.
“You can pretty much predict our first eight players on Friday morning,” said McDowell. “I’m looking forward to seeing how the next three days pan out in practice, but I can tell you that the first four guys are Poulter, Rose, Westwood and Donald, and myself and Rory are in the second group with Lawrie and Garcia. So there’s your eight, the first two groups, fairly predictable.”
After coming off the course, Westwood revealed he and Donald shot a better-ball 59 – 13 under par – to give Rose and Poulter a “proper drubbing”, while the former US Open champions McIlroy and McDowell beat Lawrie and Garcia.
In the third European group Martin Kaymer and rookie Nicolas Colsaerts lost to Swede Peter Hanson and Italy’s Franceso Molinari.
Olazabal, however, tried to play down the significance of his initial groups, saying: “I’m not going to talk about pairings. We have quite a lot of players that have done well in the past and then I’ve tried to mix a little bit of guys I believe can complement each other and who understand each other really well. That’s why I put Paul Lawrie with the Northern Irish guys and Sergio because Sergio is a guy that gets close to everyone. He can play with anyone.”
On Kaymer, Colsaerts, Hanson and Molinari, he added: “That’s where we do have four different nationalities, young guys and we are trying to just figure out certain things still.”
If McDowell’s suggestions turn out to be true, it would break-up the previously successful Donald-Garcia partnership that won all four foursomes matches at past Ryder Cups. However, Donald and Westwood did thrash Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker 6&5 in foursomes to set the tone for the European win at Celtic Manor in 2010.
