The European captain also bypassed Knox for two Ryder Cup veterans in Lee Westwood and Martin Kaymer, who will certainly bring a bit of experience to a very inexperienced team.
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When it comes to current form, Scotland’s Russell Knox and Belgium’s Thomas Pieters have the best claims to selection, world number 20 Knox finishing 10th in the world points list, just 0.04 points ahead of Pieters.
With rookies filling five of the nine automatic qualifying places – albeit one of them being Masters champion Willett – Clarke had made no secret of the fact that he wanted to “balance the team” with experienced players.
It will be the 43-year-old Westwood’s 10th straight Ryder Cup, while two-time major champion Kaymer has played in the last three Ryder Cups and made the putt that ensured Europe would retain the cup at Medinah in 2012.
But he was upstaged by Pieters’ late surge – as the 24-year-old Belgian finished fourth at the Olympics, runner-up at the Czech Open and then won the Made In Denmark championship thanks lagely to a stunning 62 scored in the company of playing partner Clarke. Describing that as one of the most impressive rounds he’d ever seen, Clarke’s final decision was clearly influenced by Pieters’ audition of sorts in Denmark.
Speaking about the inclusion of Kaymer, Clarke said “Martin Kaymer has had six top-10s in his recent events and is somewhat of a Ryder Cup stalwart”. No other player has won more during that span. Obviously Graeme McDowell and Luke Donald to go along with the experience of the other two, but they haven’t been on top of their own games. “The manner in which he’s played golf in these last few tournaments. impressed me that much”.
“He [Colsaerts] said, “if you make as many birdies as I did, you’ll be fine”, Pieters said.
Russell Knox may not be pencilling the Ryder Cup into his diary after he failed to gain a wild card yesterday but the spurned Scot is determined to prove that European skipper Darren Clarke was wrong not to call on his services.
Lee Westwood and Martin Kaymer were “very obvious” choices as two of the captain’s picks, Clarke said after making the announcement at the European Tour’s headquarters at Wentworth.
“It was a short call, a tough one for him to make, I didn’t feel like asking questions or give my opinion on it”.
“Lee is a general amongst the team, He has great experience and knowledge and knows how to deal with the team room”.
“I’ve always been a huge Thomas Pieters fan from when I first witnessed how he hits a golf ball, and how he plays”.
“The last one was hard”.
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“It’s hard to be a rookie on home soil when you have the crowd cheering for you, but to be a rookie in the States and be up against it, the crowd as well as the team, it’s a little extra”. The US side is going to be very strong, but I think we’re equally as strong.
