Ian Poulter reflected on what might have been after a weekend resurgence secured England a sixth-place finish at the Omega Mission Hills World Cup on Sunday.
Poulter, 32, and team-mate Ross Fisher headed into the tournament confident they could mastermind a first World Cup success for England since Paul Casey and Luke Donald prevailed in 2004.
However, a disappointing three-under-par 69 in first-round fourballs was followed by a two-over 74 in foursomes on Friday to all but end their challenge.
The pair improved dramatically yesterday as they shot a superb nine-under-par 63 before a 67 in today's final round propelled England up the leaderboard.
However, it had come too late to have any impact on the final outcome with eventual World Cup winners Sweden finishing 12 strokes ahead.
And Poulter, who combined with Justin Rose to finish fourth at last year's World Cup, felt England missed a golden chance for victory.
"I'm extremely disappointed with the overall position," said the Ryder Cup star.
"I think obviously, looking at the weekend, we're very happy. We've done what we thought we were capable of doing, but we only did it on Saturday and Sunday. So the first two days were such a shame.
"We've gone and shot five under today, and made two bogeys, silly bogeys at that, and we could have shot seven, eight, nine under par today. Now that's seriously good golf in foursomes.
"We walked away with nine under par yesterday and we were extremely disappointed. We felt we left probably four or five shots on the golf course.
"So looking at that, we had a chance to put ourselves in a position. We could have run close."
Despite the disappointment, Poulter was able to draw upon one positive that came out of the World Cup.
Fisher made his debut for England and made a significant impact in the improved performance over the weekend.
"The overall picture is that it is Ross' first World Cup," added Poulter. "I thought he was a good partner.
"It takes a couple of days to get used to someone when you haven't played a whole lot of golf with somebody and it was nice to do it some justice in the end."
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POULTER DRIVEN OUT
