McIlroy leads from the front as Europe close gap

United States 6.5 Europe 5.5

Pumped up, fired up and winning. That's Rory McIlroy. On the seventh green, where his partner in crime Thomas Pieters was heckled and verbally accosted as he prepared to take a putt before successfully holing it, the Northern Irishman gave his response with a roar of approval to the Belgian before fist pumping the air in the direction of the galleries.

And just as the duo had done in forming a partnership in Friday's fourballs as Europe regrouped and fought back from the humiliation of a whitewash in the opening session of foursomes, McIlroy and Pieters proved a winning pairing in maintaining that momentum and earning a 4&2 win over Phil Mickelson and Rickie Fowler.

On a beautiful sunny morning, a marked contrast to the foggy and cool weather of the opening foursomes, Europe and the United States battled it out and it was the visitors who kept their mojo going with a 2 ½ to 1 ½ win to further reduce the deficit. It meant the USA had an overall 6 ½ to 5 ½ lead going into the second session of fourballs.

McIlroy and Pieters, an unlikely foursomes pairing, bonded superbly. “If I hit a bad one, he comes back and has a brilliant one after that. It’s been like that for the last two days and it is working nicely,” said Pieters.

The European duo were on fire, with three birdies in the opening five holes to establish a lead that was never relinquished but which, at times, was shakier than it needed to be. Three up after eight holes, Mickelson and Fowler got it back to one after 12 holes before a costly three-putt on the 14th gave McIlroy and Pieters a two hole lead. Rubbing salt into the wound, the Europeans birdied the 15th and 16th to close out the match.

"When I saw the draw last night, I was like 'yes, I get to have a go at him again'. My record against him in the Ryder Cup isn't what I would like it to be. So personally I maybe wanted it a little bit more for that reason," admitted McIlroy of being faced off against Mickelson, who had previously had the upper hand on him in matches with a 3-0 success rate.

McIlroy added: “But just to go out first, put a point on the board for Team Europe, that’s what we wanted to do. We wanted to start the session off in the right vein. As Thomas said, we’ve got very similar games and I think that helps in foursomes as well.”

The English duo of Justin Rose and rookie Chris Wood beat Jimmy Walker and Zach Johnson by one hole while the Spanish Armada of Sergio Garcia and Rafa Cabrera Bella fought back from four down after 11 holes to claim a share of the spoils with Jordan Spieth and Patrick Reed in a halved match. The only American winners were Brooks Koepka and Brandt Snedeker to won by 3 and 2 over Henrik Stenson and Matt Fitzpatrick.

“The Ryder Cup is intense. You can’t explain it. It was patriotic in Rio but this is intense. It was more jovial, playful, fun in Rio and this is kind of, people are pretty serious about this stuff,” said Olympic champion Rose in contrasting that event with this.