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THE RYDER CUPOctober 3, 2010Luke DonaldRoss FisherPeter HansonPadraig HarringtonMiguel Angel JimenezIan PoulterLee WestwoodNEWPORT, WALES GORDON SIMPSON: First of all, I'd like to say, Captain Montgomerie wants to have a team meeting, but we will give as many opportunities to ask questions. I'll just start with the person next to me, Ross Fisher, how do you feel about the whole day, 5 1/2 points out of six from the session? Quite an immense session of golf I think. ROSS FISHER: Yeah, I think today was a huge day. We wanted to get as much blue, and keep it that way, and that was a great halve there for the Italian boys. Overall, that was a fantastic days, one of the best day's in Europe's history. We have a lead, but it will be tough and I think the boys are ready for. GORDON SIMPSON: You managed to put on a great show today, you must have enjoyed that victory with Miguel. PETER HANSON: Yeah, it was great. We came out today and like Lee said, they were going to come out hungry and wanted revenge for yesterday afternoon and Jeff Overton holed out on 8 for two and we felt that right away. It was a tough game, we both thought we bogeyed 14 and I made a great up-and-down on 15 and then Miguel hit two fantastic 3-irons on 16, 17, fantastic. GORDON SIMPSON: And Lee, your game with Luke was quite a special one, to get the ball rolling at the start of the day. LEE WESTWOOD: Yeah, I think we played very well. I think we were like 5-under in foursomes, which was going to take some beating, no matter who you're playing. They consider Tiger and Steve their strongest pair probably and we were obviously in a good position overnight but still, we lost the last hole we played yesterday, which could have given them a bit of momentum. You know, we tried to impress on the people that have not played in The Ryder Cup before in the locker room that they were going to come out fast, be ready for it, and we were going to come out faster, or try to. Not give too much away, not let our guard down. It's very difficult when you've got six blues on the board overnight to convert those chances. You know, the lead in six matches is not six points, and not to get ahead of ourselves. I think to come out 5 1/2 and a half today was a phenomenal effort. Games are lost after 1-up on five holes; it happens regularly. GORDON SIMPSON: You've seen some momentum changes in your time, but that was fairly dramatic today. PADRAIG HARRINGTON: Yeah, I think we were in a difficult situation going out. Even though we had all-blue on the board, we had not won those points. It was very important. Lee posted a notice on the doorway as we walked out about, you know, just how to expect that the U.S. would start fast and that we were going to have to be equally up for it. It was interesting in our game, we had to wait a few minutes to call the foursomes group through, and Zach Johnson holed a putt straight off the bat to win the hole against Rory and G-Mac on the 8th hole and I'm sure we were kind of looking, here it comes; but no more than 30 seconds later, there was a cheer from the 10th green as Lee holed his putt. So we knew there was some response there. It was very important for the team that, you know, we were starting to respond to and, I think we countered well. To get 5 1/2 points is phenomenal, really. All of the work was on us being up in six matches, so to get away with 5 1/2 matches and to get the lead going into tomorrow, it is probably the Sunday we all dreamt about at the start of the week. Unfortunately, there's a Monday. (Laughter). We know we are going to have to be really strong tomorrow. You know, this is nice. It's nice to play like we did today. It's nice to win the points. But there's a lot of work to be done tomorrow and we are going to have to make sure that we are ready for it and focussed. They have another opportunity tomorrow. Q. Luke, you can give your views while the guys are sitting down. LUKE DONALD: I think everything has been said. I mean, as Paddy said, you know, it was a nice place to be with all of that blue on the board, but it was still a place where we felt like you know, six blues on the board, couldn't get any better. So we had to hold onto those leads, as much as we could, and yeah, I mean, personally, it was just great to see Lee hole a 40-footer on 10 and get us going back to 5-up. Yeah, it's just a great day for European golf and gives us a lead going into tomorrow, which is always what you want. Q. Ross, you look so comfortable over those six birdie putts; how much of that was down to the help you got from Pádraig? ROSS FISHER: Yeah, the help from Paddy today was huge, and yesterday. You know, I struggled in the first game with Poults. I was trying to hit good putts, and they just weren't going in. So I just needed to be patient, and once I started holing a couple of putts, it gave me a lot of confidence. And when you've got a three-time Major Champion reading your putts, you've got a fair chance. All I had to do was start it on-line, and every time I seemed to do that, they seemed to drop. So it was a tremendous help, and to get two points with Paddy was, well, it was great. Q. Lee, Colin came in here last night, and talked about you as very much the main man, his No. 1 player was how he was describing you. Just talk about the significance of that and the response of that particular player in a team game? LEE WESTWOOD: Well, I think first and foremost, there are 12 main men on this team. It's a very strong team all the way through. I think what he's referring to is the fact that I've played the most Ryder Cups of anybody, and I mean, he just said to me that he wanted somebody to set the tone for the days, and so he sent me out early, and I tried to do that by coming out fast. And I think if you look at the stats with Martin the first couple of days, and Luke yesterday, got up pretty quickly, pretty early, and there's nothing like seeing a few blue numbers up on the board to get everybody else going and make everybody else a bit more comfortable. I think that's basically what he was referring to. GORDON SIMPSON: Poults, would you like to give us your thoughts, and Miguel, as well? IAN POULTER: Sure. Just a great day, you know. We had momentum yesterday. We knew the guys were going to come out hard and fast this afternoon. And the key was just try and put your foot on the pedal and keep going. We had that lead. They were coming back at us, but you know what, it just shows how strong this side is. We kept our noses in front, and looking up at that board, seeing a sea of blue is huge motivation to keep knocking it close and keep knocking those putts in. You know, it gives us a nice position to go out tomorrow and do exactly the same. You know, stay focussed. The guys are going to come out tough. They are a great U.S. Team, and you've got to expect them to come out quick. So we need to keep the blue on the board and hit the right shots at the right time and play some good golf. MIGUEL ANGEL JIMÉNEZ: Like Ian said, we just keep the momentum that we left yesterday in the afternoon and everything we had to take care of today, and we did. We played very well and very solid. They are very good players and they put a lot of pressure on us, but then the end, board is almost all in blue and that's very important for tomorrow. That means we can't relax now, you know, because tomorrow, it's going to be tough and we hope everything is keeping the way it is, and that's it. GORDON SIMPSON: Thank you very much for coming in. End of FastScripts |
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