Keegan Bradley and Luke Donald will name their first set of foursomes pairings at 9pm BST. Ben Coley ponders the state of play.
So, what is the plan?
For the United States, things have been made very clear since Monday. We have pods with just a little flexibility, Monday and Wednesday’s practice groups having been identical, Tuesday’s ever so slightly different.
Here’s how they lined up on Monday and Wednesday:
Bryson DeChambeau
Cameron Young
Ben Griffin
Justin Thomas
Scottie Scheffler
Russell Henley
Harris English
JJ Spaun
Xander Schauffele
Patrick Cantlay
Collin Morikawa
Sam Burns
On Tuesday, the only change saw Morikawa join the Scheffler group, Spaun moving into the one featuring established duo Schauffele and Cantlay. The first three days should prove a clear indication of what’s to come, and there were no real surprises among them. If anything, the prospect of Bryson DeChambeau and Cam Young forming a powerhouse foursomes combo seems to have been solidified.
Europe is a bit trickier, because so far we’ve not seen Ludvig Aberg and Viktor Hovland together. Of the four pairings who played session one in Rome, they are the only one yet to be rolled out in practice, yet I’d be surprised if they don’t feature. Thursday’s practice could take care of this nagging doubt, but remember Europe were at Bethpage a week earlier. Maybe this new information is less reliable.
Here’s how Europe have lined up so far.
Tuesday
Tommy Fleetwood
Rory McIlroy
Shane Lowry
Justin Rose
Rasmus Hojgaard
Viktor Hovland
Sepp Straka
Robert MacIntyre
Ludvig Aberg
Matt Fitzpatrick
Jon Rahm
Tyrrell Hatton
Wednesday
Tyrrell Hatton
Jon Rahm
Sepp Straka
Shane Lowry
Viktor Hovland
Robert MacIntyre
Matt Fitzpatrick
Rory McIlroy
Tommy Fleetwood
Ludvig Aberg
Rasmus Hojgaard
Justin Rose
I wonder if Wednesday’s groups could hint at Hovland-MacIntyre in fourballs, which would align with Fitzpatrick-McIlroy in that same quartet having played together twice in that format in Rome. There’s also a chance that Rose, who held MacIntyre’s hand there, is asked to do the same with Hojgaard, Europe’s sole rookie, or that Aberg will pair with the Dane.
What remains certain in my mind is that McIlroy-Fleetwood, Rahm-Hatton and, yes, Aberg-Hovland are going to be opening foursomes pairings. The doubt has to be Straka-Lowry, but they were together on Wednesday and in many ways it makes most sense to keep to this format with those two rock-solid ball-strikers, even around a softened, long Bethpage Black.
Whatever happens with Friday’s foursomes, I fully believe that both captains will bring the absent four players in for the afternoon fourballs. Gone, surely, are the days of anyone being made to wait until day two.
What about The Rumour?
The biggest rumour doing the rounds is that USA will leave all four rookies out of the opening foursomes session. I find this unbelievable, and therefore don’t believe it. That would mean no Young, the in-form New Yorker who hits it forever. It would mean no Henley, arguably their third-best player, and Scheffler’s natural partner. I can just about get on board with no Spaun, the US Open champion, and no Griffin, despite his form credentials, but the other two? No, surely not.
I suspect there’s been some skullduggery here. There is absolutely no sound justification for trying to wrap these rookies in cotton wool in a home Ryder Cup where the experienced players are not all in form, especially when two of them have played in the Presidents Cup before. If we don’t see Henley in the first set of matches, I might not be the only one looking for a new job come Saturday – Keegan Bradley may need one too.
I would remind everyone that in the days before Bradley named his wildcards, The Rumour was that Griffin would be left out. That didn’t happen, and I’ll be staggered if Henley doesn’t begin this Ryder Cup alongside Scheffler on Friday morning.
OK, so have a stab at the first session then…
Scheffler/Henley vs Hatton/Rahm
DeChambeau/Young vs Aberg/Hovland
Thomas/Griffin vs Straka/Lowry
Cantlay/Morikawa vs Fleetwood/McIlroy
Match three is where I’m least convinced. I don’t really have a sense of what the US plan is here and find it a little hard to see them leaving one of Morikawa or Thomas out, but that does look like what they’ll have to do. Given Thomas’s occasional waywardness I’m wary of assuming his cheerleader profile demands morning selection, but I like this pairing more than Morikawa/Burns.
As for Europe, if Straka has prepared well then why not go again? There’s some talk of MacIntyre-Rose but they’re yet to play together and both have relatively low floors, their respective long-games sometimes going missing. I don’t really like that as a pairing and if there is a player who merits inclusion, it could well be Fitzpatrick. Few Europeans have matched his standard of golf since May.
What else have we learned?
I’d say ‘that the US players cannot dress themselves’ but let’s be fair, their appalling suit/trainers combination for a gala dinner was chosen by someone else. Hopefully, several of them felt as silly as they looked.
Otherwise, the main takeaway has been the set-up of the course, which has strong Hazeltine 2016 vibes. There, the US cut the rough to the point where it became an irrelevance, and whether or not you believe this was key to a resounding win, it surely can’t have hurt.
Bethpage, famed for being a fearsome test as we saw most recently in the 2019 PGA Championship, has been presented as something much softer (in a literal sense) and with rough much shorter. It’s been said that the longer drivers are flying almost all fairway bunkers and that driver is being used even more than it usually would be around here.
Does that straightforwardly help the US and hinder Europe? Not necessarily, given that one of their obvious pairings (Scheffler-Henley) features two supremely accurate drivers of the ball, that they’ve several others who aren’t super-long, and that Europe has three or four of the longest hitters here, albeit not the very longest individually.
But it does potentially give Bradley licence to use that man DeChambeau more, and this looks to be the plan. His prospects of top-scoring seem to have improved, simply because five matches now rates a distinct possibility at a course which is set-up perfectly for him.
How does this affect our bets?
Should DeChambeau play four or five matches then his position as second-favourite to Scheffler in the top US scorer markets will be justified, which I had been hoping wasn’t the case. Otherwise though, there’s nothing here to dampen enthusiasm for any of the selections put forward either in my outright or specials previews.
With Scheffler guaranteed to play on Friday morning regardless, the only selection that could immediately take a massive hit would be Hovland to top-score for Europe, a smaller-stakes, somewhat speculative suggestion based largely on his likely involvement in four or five matches.
That he’s not yet played with Aberg is a very slight worry but I think this is a red herring on Europe’s part. Yes, he’s been tinkering on the range but that’s simply what he does, and he did declare to two of his teammates that Wednesday’s session was his best in two years. Hopefully, Luke Donald was listening.
Finally, are there any to add?
No. The only actionable whisper I’ve heard is for Fleetwood/McIlroy to lead out Europe on Friday but it is no more than a whisper and I’m not convinced by it. As for DeChambeau’s role, which could be more significant than I’d expected, I see no way of putting it to use. Yes, he might be sent out to hit that opening tee-shot, for which Scheffler is favourite, but I don’t expect Bradley to get swept up in making this a Bryson show.
All the bets recommended earlier in the week remain available and if you’re entering at this relatively late stage, I will say I’m surprised you can still back Rahm at 3/1 to be first out for Europe in the singles. We won’t know until late on Saturday but I’ll reiterate that I simply do not believe McIlroy, who is 1-2-0 (33% points return) from the top match versus 3-0-1 (87%) away from it, sees himself in that role any more.
Friday’s foursomes preview will be published tonight, providing UK bookmakers join me in staying up for the draw.
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