JOIN USGreat to be paired with Thongchai
The time has come. All over the city in Incheon, or at least in parts of Songdo that we have seen, the slogan is omnipresent: “The Time Has Come’ plastered around. Indeed it has.
It has been a great week so far with so much of fun, strategy and talking about plans for the Presidents Cup. It is hard not to get excited and as it is a Team Event it always pumps me up. I just love that concept.
Our bags are cool, we have a small Presidents Cup logo on it and five of the guys have one Cup each, signifying it is our first Presidents Cup and Adam Scott has ‘seven’. So, he is the most experienced from our side and he goes out first with Hideki Matsuyama, and they have played a lot together and they also practice together often on the PGA Tour.
The great news is that I have been paired with Thongchai Jaidee, the man in form, who has come off a great win in Europe and is one of the legends of Asian golf. I have known him well over the past few weeks and we also played a fine practice round together on Tuesday. I thought that was a natural pairing. He is also so consistent.
Thongchai and I are up against Rickie Fowler, popular wherever he goes, and the consistent Jimmy Walker, who has a bunch of PGA Tour wins.
Skipper Nick Price and the vice-captains, including KJ Choi, have been speaking to us a lot and they were keen to see to us go out together and it was the same feeling from our side. We know each other’s game so well and were very enthused by the faith reposed in us.
Though I am sure I would have blended and mixed well with any of the other guys, the pairings for an event like this is also a matter of strategy and how well both players understand each other’s game and complement each other. So, knowing and having played together helps a lot. That’s the thought captain Price and team would have considered while pairing us together.
Each day we have been doing some cool things, playing a bit in the team room, laughing and cracking jokes and lightening the atmosphere. We also played a little table tennis in the team room.
One day we saw highlights of 1998 win by the Internationals and Nick Price was part of the team and it is the only time Internationals won the Cup. So, he told us that it was the best day of his career and his career was a distinguished one. So that shows how much he values that win and it motivated us.
KJ (Choi) arranged a great Korean dinner last night and we enjoyed his expertise since he knows what to order and it was an awesome experience and being a foodie I loved it. The highlight was the Octopus soup!
The pairings for the first day foursomes are as follows (Internationals first):
1. Adam Scott & Hideki Matsuyama vs Bubba Watson & JB Holmes.2. Louis Oosthuizen & Branden Grace vs Matt Kuchar & Patrick Reed.3. Anirban Lahiri & Thongchai Jaidee vs Rickie Fowler & Jimmy Walker.4. Jason Day & Steven Bowditch vs Phil Mickelson & Zach Johnson.5. Danny Lee & Marc Leishman vs Jordan Spieth & Dustin Johnson.