GOLF RYDER CUP 2010:FATE CAN be a strange bedfellow, that's for sure. It can bring redemption, which is what Team Europe is in the unusual position of seeking in this 38th edition of the Ryder Cup. Or it can keep you captive. There is no middle ground. And on terrain where once Roman legionaries sought to conquer, Colin Montgomerie has marshalled his own campaigners – from Sweden and Italy, Germany and England, Spain and both parts of Ireland – and sent them forth with only one message: "Win!"

As Europe’s captain has continually emphasised since assembling his team here in the Welsh valleys, the only motivation they need in the attempt to regain the prized gold trophy is the memory of losing at Valhalla two years ago.

Of course they will need more than that for the United States has a depth – including possessing four of the top-five off the world rankings – and a steeliness about them which suggests a hard-fought and close battle. Just as it should be, in fact.

And, from the off, we know there will be surprises. Corey Pavin, the US captain, proved that you should always be on your guard and expect the unexpected when omitting new FedEx Cup champion Jim Furyk from his opening octet.

“It was probably the one pairing you wouldn’t have guessed in their team,” said Luke Donald of Pavin’s decision to match-up rookies Bubba Watson and Jeff Overton in the fourth fourball, where Donald will partner Pádraig Harrington.

Certainly, in the sort of open captaincy which he has shown all week, Montgomerie didn’t act like a magician plucking rabbits from a hat. There were no surprises in his match-ups: Lee Westwood with US PGA champion Martin Kaymer; Rory McIlroy with US Open champion Graeme McDowell; Ian Poulter with Irish Open champion Ross Fisher, and Donald and Harrington – the two “wild card” picks – anchoring the team.

Pavin, though, has cuteness. In hiding Tiger Woods in the third match (alongside his old sidekick Steve Stricker against Poulter and Fisher) – rather than pitching him into the top pairing or at the bottom of the order – the US captain has diverted pressure off the world number one. Woods’s reaction to not leading out the team?

Did he take it as a snub?

“No . . . . He’s been saying the same thing to me since I asked him if he wanted to play on the team as a pick. He just said, ‘Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do’.”

And as both teams completed their practice sessions – each restricting their endeavours to nine holes – before the main event, there was an air of let’s-get-on-with-it. The preamble has been a long four days, and players made the buggy ride from the opening ceremony’s stage to the Twenty Ten clubhouse and on to the hotel itching to get going.

There have been murmurings that some of the tee markers may be moved in the actual match, perhaps to diminish the long-hitting strengths of the US players, but that remains to be seen.

In general, the course set-up is a fair one – with the greens on the slightly slower side of the stimp, at 11, and the rough sufficiently lush at three and a half inches – with little of the home course advantage that previous captains have used. No pinching in fairways, no brushing the rough.

Maybe Europe’s team – the strongest in the competition’s history, with all players ranked within the top-42 in the world – is such that Montgomerie didn’t feel the need for such trickery. We’ll see.

Yesterday evening, he couldn’t have been happier with how the cards for the first series of four fourballs had fallen, even if he seemed somewhat befuddled by his opposite number’s decision to debut Watson and Overton.

“Strange,” Montgomerie called it, adding: “I don’t know, Luke Donald and Pádraig Harrington wouldn’t have expected that,” while Pavin explained his rationale simply by claiming the two “were chomping at the bit” to get out.

For their part, McIlroy and McDowell, were relishing the prospect of playing Stewart Cink and Matt Kuchar in the second fourballs.

“Our team is extremely strong, it didn’t matter which way we put them out. We’ve a big game on our hands, hopefully we can get some blue on the board early,” said McDowell, who made an impressive debut at Valhalla but admitted his thoughts after that defeat had turned immediately to partnering McIlroy here.

History is on Europe’s side, at least in recent times.

Those days of yore when the Americans came over every four years to go through the motions of retaining the trophy are long gone.

Indeed, the United States haven’t won the Ryder Cup on European soil since triumphing at The Belfry in 1993. It’s been a long time.

Montgomerie has seemingly ticked all the right boxes with his captaincy this week, and also with the pairings and order he has selected for the fourballs.

Now, though, it is out of his hands – others must hit the shots and hole the putts. It would seem, however, that he has the men to do the job.

FIRST DAY'S FORMAT

FOURBALL

This morning’s four fourball pairings pit two European players against two American counterparts. The best individual score wins the hole in a matchplay format where the number of holes won determines the outcome of the match.

FOURSOMES

This afternoon’s foursomes uses the same number of players – eight from each side – for four matches. However, in foursomes each pairing only uses one ball and plays alternate shots. The pairings also alternate who plays the tee shots. As in fourballs the number of holes won determines the outcome in a matchplay format.