Ballesteros the omnipresent inspiration

31st RYDER CUP: Ailing Spanish magician casts another mighty spell and conjures up a glorious end to Gallacher's captaincy

The sorcerer was without his apprentice, and he was even without his game, but his contribution to Europe's wonderful triumph in the 31st Ryder Cup at Oak Hill was nevertheless remarkable. Seve Ballesteros epitomised the spirit in the European team and was inspirational despite the fact that he could not hit the backside of an elephant with a banjo.

"I only played three times and I only hit three fairways all week," Ballesteros said. That might be an exaggeration. In the mesmerising singles on Sunday, Bernard Gallacher sent Ballesteros out first. This was a clever move. Seve had been on first-name terms with almost every oak at Oak Hill and in the singles against Tom Lehman he was beaten 4 and 3. That meant the United States, leading 9-7 after the foursomes and fourballs on Friday and Saturday, needed only four more points from 11 games to retain the Cup.

Ballesteros played his part in ensuring they did not get them. Against Lehman, the Spaniard visited every part of Rochester except the mown grass but his will to win a lost cause gave Europe the signal to come out fighting. The Ryder Cup is golf with a knuckleduster and Europe came equipped with a gumshield.

Certainly Ballesteros missed the assistance of Jose-Maria Olazabal but he gave David Gilford a massive boost. Gilford, the inaudible man from Crewe with a herd of Hereford cattle, had three victories from four matches and was Europe's joint leading contributor along with Costantino Rocca and Sam Torrance.

Even after he had been beaten you could not keep Ballesteros out of the picture. Golf is one of the most selfish pursuits but team matchplay is something else. When Nick Faldo, usually an arch rival of the Spaniard, defeated Curtis Strange to give Europe the lead by 131/2-121/2 on Sunday afternoon, Ballesteros greeted the Englishman like a long lost son. Seve was in tears and the passion of his emotion even affected Faldo.

Europe had the champagne on ice and it was liberally sprayed over the 18th green when Philip Walton, after a nerve-racking climax, beat Jay Haas to give his team the magic figure of 141/2 points out of 28.

Walton, one of Europe's two rookies, said to Ballesteros: "Keep playing. You've still got a great swing." Ballesteros, thrusting a jeroboam towards the Irishman, replied: "Don't worry about my swing. Drink this." By the time they got to the closing ceremony, half the European team were legless.

Bernard Gallacher, Europe's captain, said: "I would have to say we liked the draw in the singles. I think we got the draw we wanted." This was the key to Europe's great comeback on Sunday when they won seven games, halved one and lost only four. Gallacher had lost two close encounters as captain and never intended to stand for a third term. In the absence of an obvious replacement he was persuaded by the major players to give it one more try. That and the fact that he wanted, almost more than anything else, to carry the Ryder Cup back on Concorde.

When the match goes to Valderrama in Spain in two years' time Gallacher will be an observer. Ballesteros is the obvious replacement as captain, but that depends on how he is playing. If he is still a major contender he would like to be in the team rather than being the non-playing captain. The prospect of having a playing captain is remote.

Lanny Wadkins, Gallacher's counterpart, said that if he will be in Valderrama in 1997 he would prefer to be a member of the team rather than the leader. In terms of experience in captaincy, Gallacher had the edge. When he said that he liked the look of the draw in the singles he was making an understatement. He loved it. He placed his bankers in the middle order and they all won.

Gallacher was so confident of the result that he told Per- Ulrik Johansson, who went out last in the singles: "Don't worry. It'll be over before your match is completed." That is exactly what happened. Johansson, the other rookie in the team, had pointed out to Gallacher that he was not the man to go out 12th, that he was too inexperienced for such an important role.

It is, of course, only important if the match is hanging in the balance. That balance was tilted by Walton in the penultimate game and Johansson's defeat by Phil Mickelson became irrelevant. In the previous 30 Ryder Cups, the US had been beaten only five times and only once on American soil, at Muirfield Village, Ohio, in 1987. They were stunned by this defeat.

As much as Gallacher and his players deserved this famous victory, they were helped to a certain extent by a couple of strange decisions from Wadkins. The first mistake he made was in selecting his fellow Virginian, Curtis Strange, as one of his two wild cards. "He'll bring heart and guts to the team," Wadkins had said. Strange, who had not won on the US Tour since capturing the US Open here in 1989, was the only player in the match not to contribute a point: played three, lost three.

Against Faldo he finished 5, 5, 5 on holes with a par of 4, 4, 4 and lost by one hole. Although he was absolutely devastated, he said: "There is no man in the world I would rather go head to head with than Nick Faldo. I want to beat the best." It summed up the spirit of the match.

Wadkins's other mistake was a classic. Instead of putting his strongest players at the top in the singles, he put them at the bottom. Corey Pavin, who had an outstanding week (four victories, one defeat) batted 10th and Mickelson 12th. Not only was Mickelson redundant on Sunday, he was underplayed in the previous two days.

Gallacher's achievement means that Europe, or Britain and Ireland, is now in possession of the Ryder, Walker and Curtis Cups. He can go back to his shop at Wentworth, where the Ryder Cup first started almost 70 years ago, and, for the next two years at least, apply a little spit and polish to a gold trophy that had become the focus of his life.

Who did what in the Ryder Cup

FRIDAY SATURDAY SUNDAY TOTAL

EUROPE Foursome F'ball F'some F'ball Singles

C Rocca (Prev rec W0 H0 L2) 1 0 1 1 0 3 out of 5

S Torrance (4-6-13) 1 0 1 0 1 3 out of 5

N Faldo (19-4-13) 0 0 1 0 1 2 out of 5

B Langer (13-5-11) 1 0 1 0 0 2 out of 5

C Montgomerie (4-2-2) 0 0 1 0 1 2 out of 5

D Gilford (0-0-2) - 1 1 0 1 3 out of 4

S Ballesteros (19-5-10) - 1 - 0 0 1 out of 3

P-U Johansson (-) 1 0 - - 0 1 out of 3

I Woosnam (12-4-10) - - 0 1 1/2 11/2 out of 3

H Clark (6-1-6) 0 - - - 1 1 out of 2

M James (7-1-14) 0 - - - 1 1 out of 2

P Walton (-) - - 0 - 1 1 out of 2

UNITED STATES

C Pavin (4-0-4) 1 1 0 1 1 4 out of 5

D Love (2-0-2) 1 1 0 0 1 3 out of 5

L Roberts (-) - 1 1 1 0 3 out of 4

F Couples (3-3-6) 0 1 - 1 1/2 21/2 out of 4

J Maggert (-) 1 1 0 - 0 2 out of 4

J Haas (2-1-1) 0 - 0 1 0 1 out of 4

P Mickleson (-) - 1 - 1 1 3 out of 3

T Lehman (-) 1 - 0 - 1 2 out of 3

P Jacobsen (1-0-2) - 0 1 - 0 1 out of 3

B Faxon (-) - 0 - 1 0 1 out of 3

B Crenshaw (3-1-5) 0 - - 0 0 0 out of 3

C Strange (6-2-9) 0 - 0 - 0 0 out of 3