Faldo has best team possible

LOUISVILLE // The American captain Paul Azinger has sung the praises of the side who will try to keep hold of the Ryder Cup later this week. "You brought a great team over here again," Azinger told the Europe captain Nick Faldo soon after the team touched down. "I've been kind of marvelling at how well all of you guys have been playing."

Later, Azinger returned to the theme by calling Faldo's men "an incredible team" and when asked to comment on the decision to leave out Darren Clarke he paid another compliment. "I'm not going to try to justify why Nick didn't pick Darren Clarke. He just brought over 12 pretty darned good players and he had a couple more that he could have chosen. "If it was 14 players, I'm sure I know who the other two would be, but it's only 12." Clarke and Colin Montgomerie were the two obvious omissions.

Knowing how well Europe have done as underdogs in recent years Azinger almost seems to be grabbing the chance to adopt the same position. Asked which side go into the match with most pressure he replied: "There's always pressure at the Ryder Cup and anybody who says there's not is either out of touch or has never been here. "We have a great opportunity to change it. We have, I think, everything to gain in this situation - not a lot of people expect us to pull this off minus Tiger Woods. Everybody feels pressure, but hopefully they will be free-wheeling out there. That's my hope."

Faldo had seven of his team on the flight - Sergio Garcia, Ian Poulter, Justin Rose, Paul Casey and Henrik Stenson were already in the States - and he described them as raring to go. * PA Sport