United States (US) Ryder Cup team captain Tom Watson has said that his team would be targeting Europe's best player Rory McIlroy and their talisman Ian Poulter as the Americans seek to overturn recent golf history this week at Gleneagles.
The US have not won on European soil for 21 years, while the home team count in their ranks world number one McIlroy and three of this year's four major champions. But Watson, returning to the country where he won four of his five Open championships, believes that his unheralded team can bring down both McIlroy and Europe's great inspiration two years ago, Poulter.
Watson said that when one beats the stud on the other side, it give a boost to the team, adding that the bottom line is that if each of the players in a team wins more than they lose, they win as a team, The BBC reported.
The American said that Poulter is an 80 percent victor over the matches he has played in, adding that they would like to reduce that. He is seeking revenge for the shock defeat at Medinah in 2012, when they led 10-6 going into the final day's singles, but lost eight and drew one of the 12 matches as Poulter-led Europe pulled off one of the great Ryder Cup comebacks.
Only five of that American dozen have made it to Gleneagles, but Watson, the oldest captain in the contest's 87-year history, said that he has made it very clear to them that this trip is redemption trip.
Watson, captain when the US won at the Belfry in 1993, said that those players that played on that team, it is time to make amends and try to redeem themselves from what happened in 2012. He added that he thinks it is a motivation rather than a negative.
