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With one anecdote Britain's brightest golfing prospect justified
After becoming his team's talismanic leader in the with Severiano Ballesteros (formerly Seve Trophy), Rory McIlroy devoured the infamous words of indifference he'd expressed about team golf last May.

The 20-year-old did so while praising his captain Paul McGinley - the real star of the four sun-blessed days at Saint-Nom-La-Breteche. "Every team meeting was at half-seven this week and I actually looked forward to being in those team meetings," McIlroy said.

"I was usually turning up at quarter-past seven because there was such a buzz about them. You had all the lads in there with their ideas and Paul has a load of great ideas, especially with the team format, the foursomes and the four-balls."

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Even when he isn't playing or captaining, even when his role is supposed to be nothing more than a watching brief, sets the agenda. When it comes to stealing headlines the former European number one has form that would make Ronnie Biggs blush.

So on a day that produced an abundance of talking points, ranging from the latest heartfelt message from to Rory McIlroy retracting his infamous Ryder Cup "exhibition" quotes to the continent's reigning number one, , describing how close he came to needing injections in his eye, it was still our Monty who made the news.

Montgomerie couldn't help himself as he spoke on the eve of the Continental Europe versus GB and Ireland clash for the at Saint-Nom-La-Breteche near Paris.

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Throughout his long playing career over the - the Scot is far more Wentworth than Ponte Vedra Beach.

But that hasn't stopped Europe's Ryder Cup captain from taking note of what has been happening Stateside over the last three weeks and observing the success of the play-off series that comes to its climax at next week's Tour Championship.

This is very much part of Montgomerie's captaincy brief because he knows the demands of a successful run could have serious implications for .

Players who have successfully been beating the cut-off marks as the PGA Tour has progressively whittled down fields and are now among the elite top 30 who will compete at , are clearly in form but despite this week off they're also likely to be exhausted.

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Back at the USPGA a big tournament.

"You know the great thing about golf?" the three-time major champion said. "There's always next week. As soon as I started hitting balls on the range here it was all about this week, what happened before is gone."

This was in the wake of the eight at the 16th that cost him the chance of beating Tiger Woods in the WGC event at Firestone, ironically the start of a run of largely self-inflicted near misses that is still continuing.

But it is probably this mentality that keeps sane the majority of professional golfers. It helps them to rationalise disappointments and ruinous moments they'd love to have over again..

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