Philip Reid was at the team captains' press conference yesterday, where they both kept their cards firmly to their chests.

The tricks of the trade, it would seem. While Tom Lehman loaded up Team USA's plane from Washington with all the necessary ingredients to make tortilla chips and salsa sauce so that they could enjoy all the comforts of home once ensconced into the West Wing of The K Club hotel, Europe's captain Ian Woosnam had an altogether different type of conditioning in mind for his troops once they'd completed their first night's dining ahead of the 36th Ryder Cup which starts on Friday.

When Team Europe adjourned to the team room in the East Wing last evening, it was to view a motivational video of past heroic golfing deeds to the accompaniment of Rudyard Kipling's poem, If - "If you can keep your head when all about you, Are losing theirs and blaming it on you . . . If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster, And treat those two impostors just the same . . . " As far as Woosnam is concerned, it would seem, the time has come to get serious.

Woosnam, somewhat circumspect about revealing the exact contents of the video, gave the thumbs-up to the tape when he first viewed it in London recently. It had been put together for the European team by TWI.

The motivational video is now a traditional part of preparing European teams for the Ryder Cup, and Woosnam confessed: "We've got a very good one this year. We're going down to Dr Smurfit's cellar, (but) we don't want to drink too much of his wine. We're going to have a nice dinner, play a little bit of music and watch the inspirational tape, (to) carry on that tradition." Yesterday was very much a settling-in day for the two teams, ahead of the match which starts on Friday.

Fortunately for the two teams, given the amount of rain that fell on the course, it was also a day away from playing golf. However, the first of three official practice days begins today, with the two captains assessing the form of respective players and how well they gel with each other.

Lehman, though, admitted he pretty much knows who will comprise his four fourballs come Friday morning.

"The four teams, do I know them? I do." Since when? "I would say within the last couple of weeks," he admitted. But he refused to divulge who would be playing with who, only adding to the intrigue by indicating that, if he believes it to be the best thing to do, he would consider keeping them intact.

He explained: "Let me give you a 'what if'. What would you do if you put four teams out every day that kept on winning? Would you split up a winning team in that scenario? What happens to the rest of the guys? I would not prefer not to play everybody (in the fourballs and foursomes). I don't think it would be the wisest come singles time not to play everybody.

"But what do you do if something like that happens? We're here to win, and if things are going great, then we all just, you know, take one for the team."

While Lehman knows the likely formation of his opening four fourballs, Woosnam intends to watch and observe the next three days of practice before committing to any formations.

"We've got 12 great players this year, probably the strongest team we've ever had. They are all prepared to play with whoever they want to play with, it's up to me to get the pairings right . . . there are so many different pairings I can use. I'll see how everybody is performing over the next two days before I actually put out my pairings."

However, Woosnam doesn't envisage a situation where someone will go into the singles cold, a situation which occurred in the 1999 match at Brookline when three players - Jarmo Sandelin, Andrew Coltart and Jean van de Velde - were not played over the opening two days and all subsequently lost their singles matches.

"At the end of the day, we're here to do one thing and the one thing is to win the Ryder Cup. If someone doesn't play the first two days, it'll be because they were out of form or something like that."

Of his captain's role, Woosnam, who came in for criticism from Thomas Bjorn after being bypassed for a "wild-card" pick, the Dane only apologising after being hit by a fine by the PGA European Tour, claimed he could be "inspirational". He explained: "You know, a lot of things happen in the team room. The guys have to perform on the golf course but a lot goes on in the team room (for a player) to go out and enjoy it. If you don't enjoy it, it's hard work."