It was Saturday evening in the team room at Oak Hill and the European players were attempting to come to terms with a deficit of 7-9 entering the 12 singles matches on the following day. Not a word was uttered. Suddenly, Philip Walton walked up to a blackboard, took chalk in hand and wrote the one word, WIN.

This simple, innocent gesture fitted the occasion perfectly. While making comment redundant, even from skipper Bernard Gallacher, it struck just the right note for a team who were acutely aware of the forbidding task which lay ahead.

"I had learned from my experiences in the Walker Cup that you've got to look for positive things in a highly pressurised situation," recalled Walton yesterday. "Usually they are small things that you wouldn't take much heed of in normal circumstances."

So it was that while standing on the first tee on that fateful Sunday four years ago, he took particular note of the demeanour of his opponent, Jay Haas, even to the point of staring directly into his face. "I thought he looked pale and nervous," he said. "Maybe he wasn't, but it suited me to think so. It suited me that a solid, seasoned player with nine US tournament wins to his credit could be as nervous as a kitten. That gave me great hope."

It had been a long journey for Walton to Oak Hill. He looked certain of making his Ryder Cup debut at The Belfry in 1989, but failure to make the cut in the last qualifying event, the German Open, destroyed his chance. And the vacant wild card went instead to compatriot Christy O'Connor Jnr.

From early days in junior golf, Walton had been groomed for this form of combat. "People make the mistake of thinking that some of the Americans can be soft when it comes to matchplay," he said. "That's not so. The fact is that they simply don't get the sort of matchplay opportunities that we get, especially at amateur level."

He went on: "I suppose the most important years for American tour players are those spent at college. And during my two years at Oklahoma State, where Jeff Maggert was a close mate, we played nothing only strokeplay tournaments. So the Americans don't learn the tricks of matchplay, which are very important.

"As an international player at various levels, before going on eventually to the Walker Cup, I learned that you must set out to wear down your opponent, shot by shot. If he drives it in the rough, you must try your damnedest to keep it on the fairway; if he hits it 250 yards, you must try to hit it 260; if his approach is 10 feet from the hole, you must get inside him.

"Everyone is going to be nervous but it becomes a question of how well you control your nerves. When Nick Faldo won that great point against Curtis Strange at Oak Hill, I remember thinking: `Oh Jaysus, I can't believe this. Everything is down to me.' It's in those situations you discover whether you've the guts for the big occasion - and I know I took a lot of strength from my Walker Cup matches."

He certainly would have had reason to be proud of the 1983 matches at Hoylake, where he gained a wonderful, first day win over the US playing captain, Jay Sigel, arguably the world's best amateur at that time. And there was a memorable singles victory over Ron Commans at Cypress Point two years previously. He had got used to beating players with superior reputations.

Yet he admitted: "When we arrived in Oak Hill, I felt like a little boy being led along by guys who had been down that road before. Players like Sam Torrance, Ian Woosnam and Costantino Rocca were a great help. So were Mark James and Howard Clark. They gave me a sense of belonging, which was very important.

"But it remained a very pressurised week. You know you're laying everything on the line - your reputation as a serious tournament player. I was a bag of nerves from the time I arrived there until I wrapped up my win over Haas on the 18th. I felt I was under a microscope everywhere I went. Yet the locals were surprisingly helpful. I remember a locker-room attendant giving me two Oak Hill ballmarkers, which he said would bring me luck. And I used them.

"I wasn't swinging the club all that well, which increased the pressure. I remember thinking how strong the Americans looked in the foursomes and fourballs. And the way a match could be turned around by one, crucial shot. I hoped I could make something like that happened against Haas."

He went on: "On the Sunday morning, things didn't look good for us but we got lucky with the way the singles draw worked out. And when I got to the short 15th two up on Haas, I produced one of the most important shots of my career. I had 184 yards and hit the sweetest six iron . . . it was the first time I had attacked a flag all day. The ball finished four feet from the flag and I knocked in the birdie putt to go dormie three. After that, all I had to do was finish it off."

Walton was the lone Irishman on that victorious team. Now the country is to be represented by Darren Clarke and Padraig Harrington in an attempt at beating the Americans for a third time on home soil. "Darren is obviously a class player and I was really impressed with the way Padraig battled his way into the side," he said.

"That putt he sank - it must have been a good eight feet - on the final green in the BMW took a lot of guts. By the confident way he stands over putts, you feel he's going to hole them. That'll be a priceless asset in the Ryder Cup. I know I putted great at Oak Hill. Putting is also the reason James was right not to pick Faldo. If you're not confident of getting the ball into the hole, you're going to be struggling to win matches, no matter how much guts you have."

Sadly, Walton's golfing fortunes have plummeted since those heady days in Rochester. When battle commences 3,000 miles away next Thursday, he will be at home, following the fortunes of the European team on television, hoping that Colin Montgomerie will fill his designated role as their on-course leader, with Lee Westwood as a trusted lieutenant.

And in the quiet of North Co Dublin, he will share their agony over every wayward drive, flawed iron shot and missed putt. He will jump with delight at the holed 20-footers, provided a European is holding the blade. And he will know that there is no sense of exultation after securing a hard-fought point, only a feeling of immense relief at not having let one's colleagues down.

"I'll be rooting for the lads, but they face a helluva battle," he concluded.