Sporting Advent Calendar #20: McGinley masterminds Ryder Cup win over divided USA

The American fight came when it was too late. Europe - under Paul McGinley's captaincy - had outplayed the USA where it mattered, on the golf course, to win the Ryder Cup at Gleneagles. It was a third straight win in the biennial match and the eighth time in 10 stagings that Europe had emerged triumphant.

"The Europeans kicked our butt," observed USA captain Tom Watson.

Watson possessed that cheeky, boyish grin when he made that observation. However, that smile was soon wiped from his face after Phil Mickelson - in the post-Ryder Cup media conference following Europe's 16 ½ to 11 ½ win - opened a can of worms by publically criticising his captain as a primary reason for the USA's defeat.

Not once did Mickelson mention Watson by name, but each word - directed like an arrow at the bullseye on an archery board - hit its target.

Mickelson, a veteran of 10 Ryder Cups, had been left twiddling his thumbs all day Saturday when benched by Watson. On that Saturday night, Watson rubbed salt into wounds by snubbing a gift from the players presented to him by Jim Furyk. Discontent was fermenting, and it bubbled over in defeat on Sunday evening as Mickelson cut loose.

Watson had seemed distant from his players throughout the week at Gleneagles, a direct contrast to McGinley’s interaction with his men. When he went on the attack, Mickelson was critical of the lack of player involvement by Watson. He contrasted Paul Azinger’s captaincy at Valhalla in 2008 - the last USA win - to demonstrate what was wrong with Watson’s.

As Mickelson put it, “(Azinger) got everybody invested in who they were going to play with, who the picks were going to be, who was going to be in their pod and when they would play . . . he had a gameplan for us . . . how we were going to go about playing together; golf ball, format, what we were going to do, if so-and-so is playing well, if so-and-so is not playing well. We had a real game plan.”

The inference was that there was no American gameplan at Gleneagles, when - truth be told - regardless of how shambolic the USA leadership seemed, they were outplayed and outthought by a European team that was simply far better.

McGinley’s thought process in orchestrating the win went as far as ensuring the fish in the tank in the teamroom were blue and yellow - the colours of the European flag - and that an image of Seve Ballesteros was the last thing players passed on leaving the underground tunnel to the first tee.

As Graeme McDowell observed, “Paul commanded a huge amount of respect in that team room. I found myself listening to a very educated, organised guy. He kept talking about everything having a meaning. Every visual, every video, very message had an end game.”