Northern Irish golfer Graeme McDowell has admitted that although he did have brief doubts about the master plan chalked up by European Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley but he feels now that the Irishman has broken the mould that all future Ryder Cup captains will be judged on.
McDowell was paired with rookie Frenchman Victor Dubuisson and the pair played so well in their foursomes victory over Keegan Bradley and Phil Mickelson that they were expected to take the course again for the four balls on Saturday morning.
But that didn’t happen and the Scotsman stuck with his plan to only play the unlikely pair in the alternate shots format so that the Northern Irishman would feel fresh for the first singles match. But although it seemed to backfire with Graeme McDowell falling three shots behind Jordan Spieth, he did recover from there as he has made a habit of it over the past few years to win the matchup.
McDowell stated that during the first six holes, he was having doubts because he had played so little that he felt undercooked, adding that he hadn’t hit many shots because of the way the foursomes were planned out.
And McDowell went on to add that Paul McGinley has been the best captain that he has played under during his time as a player on Team Europe in the Ryder Cup. He mentioned that for a guy like the Scotsman who would be sitting in front of twelve players whose careers would be a lot better than his, McGinley showed immense courage, drive and desire to motivate and inspire those players to send them out onto the course and get the job done.
Graeme McDowell also said that this only shows that one doesn’t need to be a great player to be a good leader.