Ryder Cup wildcard Paul Casey has stressed captain Nick Faldo was not to blame for Europe's comprehensive defeat in Valhalla last month.
Faldo was savaged in sections of the media for a number of decisions before and during the biennial event, including his wildcard selections, leaving Lee Westwood and Sergio Garcia out of the Saturday foursomes and the risky strategy he employed for the 12 crucial singles matches on the Sunday in a bid to overcome a 9-7 deficit.
The latter saw in-form Ian Poulter's win over Steve Stricker, as well as the matches involving double major winner Padraig Harrington and Ryder Cup stalwart Westwood, rendered obsolete with Jim Furyk having already completed a 2&1 victory against Miguel Angel Jimenez to ensure the Americans tasted victory for the first time since 1999 by 16 1/2 points to 11 1/2.
Casey, however, has joined the list of players that have since leapt to Faldo's defence, insisting the 51-year-old Englishman did everything in his power to secure an unprecedented fourth consecutive European success and that ultimately, he was on a hiding to nothing.
"It didn't matter who it was, if we didn't win, they were going to get it in the neck," he said.
"Nick's Nick. He tried his hardest, he poured his heart out into it and whether it was everybody's cup of tea, the way he approached things, that's their opinion.
"He cares about it, we care about it and it's the way it turned out. I feel sorry for him because I think he's taken a pretty hard rap."
Casey also revealed he had recently contacted Faldo to refute suggestions he had undermined his captaincy.
"I spoke to him a couple of weeks ago. There was a nice rumour going around that I was apparently unhappy with Nick and I was threatening to walk out of the Ryder Cup team," added the 31-year-old, who was in Hong Kong as part of a charity golf day for victims of the Sichuan earthquake.
"That was a rumour I had heard circling around various things and that is complete and utter rubbish. I actually called him and said 'have you heard this rumour'? He said, 'yeah, I've heard'. Nobody knew where it came from so I've spoken to him.
"It's malicious and it didn't get printed. I threatened legal action if that came out because that's just not true. I've had enough of that stuff."
The disappointment in Kentucky was all the more acute given Europe found themselves burdened with the favourites' tag against an American team shorn of the world's best golfer in Tiger Woods.
Casey, though, feels the quality of their opponents' performance was overshadowed by the aftermath of Europe's failed bid.
"Were we favourites? With or without Tiger it was completely irrelevant, they had 12 great golfers and I think they did almost everything right," he said.
"The guys were up for it, they had the crowd with them, they set the golf course up the way they wanted it set up.
"They knew the pin positions, they knew where to fire and hit shots and if you look at Sunday, it was amazing with some of those pin positions how you could bank it in off certain areas. They knew that and we got beaten.
"I don't think there's been enough credit given to the US for playing very, very good golf."
Casey, who picked up two half points in three matches, claimed that, as so often in top-level sport, success or failure at Valhalla was decided by the finest of margins.
"The putts we made at the K Club (in 2006) were outrageous - putts going in all over the place - and that's what they did to us this time," he concluded.
"In my match against Hunter Mahan, he hit his putt on 17 and I thought 'hello, I've got a chance of winning this match from being down', but it hits the back of the hole and goes in when it was probably going 15 feet by.
"He knew it, I knew it, we both had a laugh about it - as much as you could - down the 18th fairway. It could have been different, so that's the way the players feel about it. There's been a lot of criticism about what Faldo allegedly didn't do but it's done.
"We see it differently as players being in that team room - ultimately we've got to get the ball in the hole and make the putts and we didn't necessarily do that in Valhalla. But I loved the experience playing for Nick."
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