EUROPEAN Ryder Cup captain Colin Montgomerie has assured his American counterpart Corey Pavin of a sporting reception at Celtic Manor after refusing to fan any flames of controversy left smouldering from 1991 at Kiawah Island, when Pavin wore a camouflage cap bearing a Desert Storm inscription to whip up the home galleries.
While the Scot confided he was shocked by the hostility in the match on his debut 18 years ago when jingoism was rife and a local radio station made dawn wake-up telephone calls to the European players, Montgomerie believes next September's encounter
will be defined by sportsmanship rather than conflict.
If there hasn't been a minute of any day since he was named as captain when the subject of winning back Samuel Ryder's cup wasn't uppermost in his mind, Montgomerie is adamant Europe can reclaim the trophy without recourse to the kind of personal abuse from the crowd he suffered personally at Brookline in 1999.
Asked if he felt Pavin's patriot games at Kiawah might come back to haunt the American captain, who is competing in the Wales Open this week, Monty replied: "There will be no antagonism shown towards Corey at all. Those days are gone. The Ryder Cup is a very different competition to what it once was. In a positive sense, 9/11 changed the world and there will be no antagonism towards any American visitor to Wales next year. They'll all be made welcome and we'll have a great tournament.
"Corey is already in Wales. To be honest with you, I've not really met him socially before and the times we've met up has been at the major championships both in the States and the Open here. I also played him three times in the Ryder Cup matches. We're having a dinner on Wednesday with our wives and representatives from the European Tour and the PGA of America."
Although full of admiration for many aspects of Paul Azinger's captaincy when the US won in Louisville last autumn, Montgomerie won't repeat Azinger's advice to the Kentucky crowds to cheer when the opposition missed.
"There's no question Paul was fantastic," he said. "He changed the system, the rules, everything. He got the Americans playing like the Europeans for the first time. Good on him. Now it's my job to redress that and get the Europeans playing like the Europeans again."
But would he urge the spectators to cheer US misses? "Not at all," insisted the Scot. "For me the match has changed over the years. Of course you will hear different cheers in a home event. But that's home advantage. It's the only thing I will be looking for."
Another significant aspect of home advantage is course knowledge. Monty wants his players to be better acquainted with the TwentyTen lay-out than their American counterparts and has asked all the contenders for his side who don't play in the Wales Open this week to make the effort in 2010. "I can't insist on any one doing any thing," he added. "They are individuals, all self-employed. I can't tell, but I can ask. But I would like to think if I ask people to play in the Wales Open who don't take part this year then it will be in their own interests to play next time.
"I've got three picks and if they do well in the Wales Open then there's more of an opportunity for them. If you win on the course that's hosting the tournament, then it's a big plus for any captain. The same will apply, I'm sure, at Gleneagles in 2014."
Montgomerie was speaking at a press conference in Perthshire yesterday to promote the tenth anniversary of the Johnnie Walker Championship over the PGA Centenary course from 27-30 August.
In the wake of criticism from Darren Clarke and Lee Westwood over the state of the greens at Gleneagles, Montgomerie, chairman of the championship committee, reported how £2 million was being spent on improvements and alterations. "This year we have a new hole and the par is reduced to 72, which is the right way to go. The 12th has been changed to a challenging par-4 from a reachable par-5. For the sake of the Ryder Cup, it had to be changed because you couldn't build stands or get 10,000 people round the back of the old 12th green.
"We've had challenges here over the years. The level of investment in these times is nothing short of remarkable. You'll see a dramatic difference here in the quality of everything, the greens included."
