Warrior Westwood will lead ‘chest out, chin up’

After naming his wild card selections, announcing his first pairings at the opening ceremony and delivering the final, rousing speech to his players, the destiny of the greatest team event in golf rests in the hands of the 12 men who are representing him.

Yes, there will be times when he can offer a word of encouragement here or a nugget of advice there.

But it remains one of the great miscarriages of sporting justice that Ryder Cup captains live and die on the results over which they have no physical bearing.

If Jose Maria Olazabal’s European team win at Medinah this week, the Spaniard will be feted as one of the continent’s greatest combatants in the biennial matches.

If they lose, it will be an unwanted asterisk at the side of Olazabal’s name: Great player, but could not win as captain.

What he needs this week in Chicago, what will help him rest easier when the opening tee shots have been played and control is stripped from his grasp, is an on-course lieutenant to inspire and lift his players.

Step forward, with chin up and chest out, Lee Westwood – Europe’s leader by example.

The 39-year-old from Worksop is not only this European team’s most capped player, he is also one of their best when it comes to the matchplay format.

He has taken over where Colin Montgomerie left off, letting his woods, irons and putter do the talking.

If Olazabal wants to get blue on the scoreboards early at Medinah, send Westwood out first.

Like Montgomerie, he has no major to his name, only a collection of near misses. But when it comes to the Ryder Cup he is a captain in the making, and a player who in time will go down as one of Europe’s greatest.

His record speaks for itself; he is the eighth most successful European of all time with a 58 per cent scoring rate.

He has 16 wins, six halves and 11 defeats for a total of 19 points, six shy of the 25 garnered by Nick Faldo, who was the man who took the young Westwood under his wing 15 years ago at Valderrama.

Westwood has only suffered team defeat twice in his seven appearances and on the second of those occasions, 2008, he actually matched the great Arnold Palmer’s 12-game unbeaten run.

Also in that match, Westwood was closing in on the record 29 consecutive sessions played by Seve Ballesteros when he was benched by Faldo on the morning of the second day.

But Westwood is about more than just statistics.

He raises his game for the Ryder Cup and leads by example. Two years ago he had not played competitively for two months as he nursed a calf injury to full health but still played every session, including 38 holes on an energy-sapping Saturday, to win two and a half points.

He also teamed up with Luke Donald to eviscerate Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker in the top match of the amalgamated third session, with a demonstration of foursomes golf that had his caddie Billy Foster drawing comparisons to the great Ballesteros and Olazabal partnership.

Westwood needed a wild card at the K Club four years earlier, but formed a formidable, emotional and unbeatable partnership with Darren Clarke.

At The Belfry in 2002, when Westwood was at the start of a dramatic slump that saw him drop from fourth in the world to 266th, he did captain Sam Torrance and Europe proud by winning three of his four matches alongside Sergio Garcia.

And the reason Westwood performs so well in the intense pressure cooker of a Ryder Cup?

“It’s because I enjoy matchplay,” was his modest answer.

“I’m very passionate in matchplay and I don’t think I give too many holes away. I hit a lot of fairways and greens, and they set the golf course up for the Ryder Cup fairly demanding.

“And like I’ve always said, in the foursomes and fourballs, I’ve always been very fortunate to have great partners, partners with similar games to myself. I’ve always been paired up with, say, Monty who hits a lot of fairways or Sergio and Darren who are great drivers of the golf ball, and Nick, Soren Hansen.

“It’s not hard to play well when you’ve got partners like that. But I think the record is partly due to the intensity that I pull together for Ryder Cups.”

Tactically he is a shrewd as they come, having enjoyed his fair share of fourballs, foursomes and singles tussles. “With matchplay, you have to know when to attack and when to defend. You learn how to do that and read the game,” said Westwood.

“Sometimes pars are great, and they are going to win you holes. I always try to play matchplay and not give too much away, not make too many bogeys where you give the opposition an easy advantage, but you do that, anyway, when you play in strokeplay.

“So it’s just something that you learn to do I suppose and you do it subconsciously in the end.”

Westwood has rediscovered his form of late and eased his jitters around the greens after a few tips from old pro Tony Johnstone, who is wielding more coaching influence over the world No 4.

After previously shunning the FedEx Cup because it clashed with the school holidays, Westwood has just finishing competing in the lucrative Tour Championship in Atlanta.

He has said recently that he would like to play alongside Rory McIlroy, the world No 1 from whom he is publicly estranged, but Olazabal looks likely to pair him with the side’s only rookie, Nicolas Colsaerts, who hits the ball a ‘mile’.

The Spaniard, though, would be foolish not to contemplate pairing Westwood with either Donald or Garcia and unleashing them on the Americans.

Whoever he stands alongside, Westwood is happy to play the role of guiding hand.

“I don’t mind it,” he said. “I’m going to go out there and try and hit the first fairway in my match. Try and knock it on the green, try and win that first hole, try and win a point that first morning; if I’m playing, of course.

“And I want to see 11 people stood there right behind me following me. I mean, I know everybody can’t play, but I think when push comes to shove, if I get out there – chest out, chin up – I suppose I’ve got the most experience to try and show them how it’s done.

“I think we have got 11 great players that are well capable of following me through there and playing to the best of their ability.”