"Quiet please, Monty"

Captain Monty...make that, Field Marshal Monty's relentless Ryder Cup hyping is even wearing down the British press, which normally soaks up Ryder Cup talk. Seizing on a Daily Telegraph quote, here's Lawrence Donegan writing for The Guardian:

"The team is looking extremely strong. They all want to make the team so badly. I know that. They've told me. It's very exciting.

"I will have an issue with my three picks. I'm going to have 10 potential clients for three spots, all feeling that they have a right to be there. It's going to be difficult. This year I'm going to be talking team set-up and not trousers, shirts, menus and rooms."

And previous Ryder Cup captains, unlike Field Marshal Montgomerie, concentrated on the trousers rather than the important stuff, like team set-up? Please.

No doubt there will be more of the same this week, and next week and the week after that, all the way until October. It's hardly Montgomerie's fault if he is asked about the Ryder Cup. But does he really need to frame every shot, every moment, of the golfing year in the context of an event that won't take for another eight months? He could respond by saying that if, as Kaymer points out, the players don't take subject seriously until June, it would be best if everyone else adopted the same approach.