When a loved one passes away, apart from the heartache and grief of losing them from your life, personally speaking, the most difficult bit is the clear out when the dust has settled. Of their possessions and/or special effects.
Yes, this corner would be extremely sentimental to the point of being a hoarder, but sometimes there are things the unearthing of which will absolutely send you sideways. Most recently, it was a golf club. Now read on…
Not just any metal stick, mind you. A Walker Cup winning putter, to be exact. For you see, the gentle man and gentleman of the tee to green action, Tom Craddock, was related to my father through marriage. Many moons ago, we used to visit Tom and his wife Nola in their home in Malahide quite regularly. At the end of one of the visits, Tom called me aside and said he had something which he wanted me to have.
Now, I knew it was obviously going to be something connected to golf, but when he emerged with a putter complete with solid gold head, one could only be taken aback. Even more so when it emerged to be the finisher he had taken into battle in the biennial multifaceted team event. The putter which he had affectionately termed ‘The Golden Goose’.
Not surprisingly, that germinated a bit of a golf craze with the occupant of this seat. To the extent that, an old full set of clubs my brother bought in Arnotts years beforehand were resurrected from the attic and a golf hole dug out the back. It must be admitted, though, that my intake of the tee-to-green fare in the intervening period has been sporadic at best. Mind you, there are, as Baz Lurhrmann famously put it in Sunscreen, certain inalienable truths.
Consumption of the US Masters is absolutely non negotiable. As are events like the PDC World Darts Championship, as much of the equivalent event in snooker as is possible and ditto Wimbledon for the Tennis. Aside from the early April action at the iconic Augusta National, the other golfing contribution to the sports viewing staple diet is the Ryder Cup.
Perhaps it’s the team element to it, or the us against them mentality. But there’s something utterly enthralling about it. On some sort of par with, say, a Lions tour in rugby. Ironically, having said all of the above, I was less attuned to this year’s build up than perhaps ever before. Albeit due to distressing circumstances outside of my control.
My earliest ‘proper’ Ryder Cup memory – apart from Christy O’Connor Jnr’s iconic second shot in the closing stages long ago – centres around Philip Walton in what I think was 1995. Walton was, coincidentally, also related to Tom Craddock, so his sinking of the winning putt carried even greater significance.
Then it was Paul McGinley’s turn. As the Ballyboden man was dispacthed for an unscheduled wash after doing the needful on another occasion. Thereafter, you could draw a line from Darren Clarke to Graeme McDowell on to Padraig Harrington, Rory McIlroy and finishing at Shane Lowry to illustrate Ireland’s profound influence on the long running joust between the cream of European golf and the best they can field Stateside.
As stated above, I would have been less in tune with the build up to this incarnation of the age old contest. Not least due to the chaos surrounding what was formerly known as the European Tour. The majority of the blue and gold brigade – with the obvious exceptions of Rory and Shane and Justin Rose – were, at the start of the event, largely unknown to me.
However, there’s nothing like a success to expose viewers to new heroes. Just as there will be a new generation of hurlers in Limerick drawn to the flame owing to the Treaty men’s astounding success rate in recent seasons, there will, no doubt, be youngsters here, there and everywhere trying to chip balls into the washing machine a la Rory.
Anyway, aside from all that, the other factor which had swayed me to think the stars and stripes held the upper hand coming into the fixture was the fact that they had most of the form players at their disposal.
In the guise of Colin Morikawa, Xander Schauffle, Scottie Scheffler and Brookes Koepka. However, the Ryder Cup is a law unto itself and can inspire players to find that they maybe didn’t they had themselves.
Though again, with no smidgeon of irony, those who over the years could be relied upon to inject a bit of mania into matters from a European perspective – McGinley and Ian Poulter and Lee Westwood and G Mac and Sergio Garcia – were only memories.
Still, time nor tide waits for no man or woman or beast and, while the warriors of old would of course be missed, their absence would, naturally, open the door for others to come to the fore. Topping that bill, undoubtedly, were Viktor Hovland of Norway and Ludvig Aberg of Sweden who not only grabbed the event by the scruff of the neck but also wrote their own piece of history by dolling out the biggest thrashing in the history of the old competition, 9 & 7, – in other words they were nine shots ahead of the US pairing, Scheffler and Koepka, with only seven holes remaining.
Having said that, even though Luke Donald’s side raced into a 4-0 lead after the Friday morning session and, by Saturday lunchtime had bolstered the chasm to 9.5 playing 2.5 thanks to the Scandinavian record breakers – and other wins for Rory McIIroy/Tommy Fleetwood and the Jon Rahm/Tyrell Hatton combination, in any team sport, the opposition will always get their spell of dominance.
So it was that, by that same evening, the Americans had eventually got the lead out of their collective backsides and dominated the second day’s afternoon session as Sam Burns (Colin Morikawa), Brian Harmon (Max Homa) and Patrick Cantlay (Wyndham Clarke) all chalked up victories for the stars and stripes prior to the commencement of the final day’s singles action.
The upshot of which was that, having clocked up 10.5 points heading into the home straight, the continent only needed another four from the mano-o-mano battles in order to usurp the country. Even at that though, there was always going to be a reaction from Zach Johnson’s outfit. They who love a war, even ones they start for no reason.
With that in mind, and with Cantlay already having riled Rory, the last thing the cauldron needed was more paraffin applied thereto. But then, Jim Bones McKay couldn’t have been around Phil Mickelson for so long without becoming like him – a cranky old troublemaker. Mind you, if he thought rattling a few continental cages was about to better the plight of the so-called land of the free, he picked the wrong bear to poke in McIlroy.
Rory reminds me of Roy Keane in some ways. In this instance, that you have to get him angry to get the best out of him and, once the Star Of The Co Down gave the old grump both barrels in the carpark on the Saturday night, there was only going to be one outcome to the Sunday showdown. Therein, all the American big names – Scheffler, Schauffle, Koepka and Cantlay – were taken care of.
However, throwing on the patriotic cape and staying with the theme which has flowed throughout this offering, wasn’t it only fitting that it was our own Shane Lowry who bagged the half point required to land the spoils of victory. The two Irish lads weren’t bad at leading the celebrations either!
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