OLIVIA McMILLAN: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I am delighted to be joined by some of the members of our GB&I Walker Cup team. We have, of course, Captain Dean Robertson, we have Eliot Baker and Stuart Grehan. Thank you so much for joining us.
Dean, I'll start with a question for you. I know you've been a very hands-on captain and you've been incredibly detail orientated in your preparations. Now that we're here in match week, how are you seeing those preparations start to pay off?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Yeah, I think that the preparations started a long time ago, certainly going back to the Arnold Palmer Cup in '24 to get to understand Lahinch as a golf course. Before that, I hadn't been here since 1991.
It's a unique links course in that it's so upgrained by the dunes, and the skill set that's required is so different from Cypress Point. We really targeted that, and we've had a bunch of camps to work on things.
THE MODERATOR: Without giving away any team secrets, can you tell us a little bit about what you've been focusing on this week? I know you had Paul McGinley join the team, perhaps Padraig Harrington as well. What have they been adding to the dynamic for you?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Just keeping it simple, really. The golf course is in front of you. You've got the Klondyke. You've got The Dell. It's very unique. It demands a lot of strategy, so it's not a golf course you can overpower.
We've really been focusing in on that. We're getting to see -- with the weather, we're getting to see it in really difficult conditions, so that's good. With that requires a lot of ball flight control, and that goes without saying. Those are the things we've been working on.
Q. Eliot, this is your second Walker Cup. How has the experience from last year helped you so far this week?
ELIOT BAKER: Yeah, massively. Yeah, just knowing what to expect coming into it, knowing what the setup is going to look like, it definitely makes you settle in a lot quicker. It just means we can get to work a lot quicker and we're not figuring stuff out as much.
Q. You've got a great match play record in things like the St Andrews Trophy and the Home Internationals. What about match play lends itself to you and your game, and why do you love it so much?
ELIOT BAKER: Not too sure, really. I think just match play shows if you just stick to your own game, you can kind of beat anyone out there. If you trust what you're doing is good enough, then yeah, if you play well, you can take down anyone.
Q. Stuart, now that we're here and it's match week and we're here on home soil, how special is it for you to be Irish representing GB&I in Ireland?
STUART GREHAN: Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, something I've always kind of looked towards, look forward to. As you said, to be here now, yeah, it's pretty cool. I've got some family that's come in last night, and it's kind of starting to hit home when there's a few more people floating around, so the excitement is building.
Q. Lahinch in particular holds special memories for you. You won the South of Ireland here in 2015. Course knowledge is so important; how beneficial is that for you personally but for you to bring to the team?
STUART GREHAN: Yeah, I've played here a bunch of times. I've probably played 30, 40 times out here, and yeah, I don't have to, I suppose, practise as much as around the greens as most of the guys. I kind of know the little subtle breaks.
I've been trying to give my best advice to them, but look, they're all really good players and we've done incredible prep, I feel like, over the last few days, and we'll see how it goes.
But I think we're all very, very happy where we're at.
Q. Dean, she touched briefly on the old guard who's been out imparting wisdom. Ian was walking with you guys today. It seems like everyone is a bit more involved than last year at Cypress. Was that more of a concerted effort to get more voices around these guys in person?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Yes. I mean, experience around here, as Stuart alluded to, Stuart has been around this golf course that many times, and even today, you're learning something new about Lahinch every day that you play it. The wind just changes a little bit or strengthens. Gaining course knowledge was really number one priority for me.
McGinley is a former South of Ireland winner as well. He's a successful Ryder Cup captain. He sits in the back room of Luke Donald. He's got a wealth of knowledge. So he's been giving us some really good pointers as well. It's been a real collective effort.
Q. We talked about this on the course a little bit earlier, but could you just give us an update on Tyler Weaver's health and status and what you're looking forward to seeing him do this weekend?
DEAN ROBERTSON: So Tyler is a really mature athlete. He's been through a real difficult year with an oblique injury, and he's had to sit out. He's taken the difficult decisions to miss Merion, to miss the U.S. Amateur and prioritize the Walker Cup this week. He's good to go Saturday, and he's controlling the ball flight nicely, and he's just hitting it nice and easy.
Q. Stuart, you talked about your experience here and playing with a scorecard in your hand. How different does the course play in a match play setting, and are there two or three specific shots you can think of that you maybe take on this week that you wouldn't take on in stroke play?
STUART GREHAN: Yeah, probably the hole that comes off the top of my head is probably No. 4. Normally if I'm playing a stroke play tournament, I'll just hit an iron or hybrid off the tee and then hit iron on to the green, but maybe with the back left flag, you might think about hitting driver right. I've seen a lot of people kind of doing that.
Then it'll depend on 13. I think that's obviously drivable, but again, very much pin dependent. That's actually the first time I've ever played that wind actually straight out. For me to play that this week for how many times I've played here is quite unique. They're probably the two holes that kind of make the biggest difference.
Q. Eliot, had you played a lot of golf in this area prior to the team being announced? How many times have you played Lahinch since?
ELIOT BAKER: Yeah, so I hadn't been to this area before, but when South of Ireland was on, we came over for a training camp. We got to know the place. So played a couple times then. Then just been back now and got plenty of prep in this week.
Q. Dean, can you sum up what Padraig Harrington told the guys?
DEAN ROBERTSON: So we haven't spoken to Padraig, but Padraig has been a great supporter and has sent messages last year, so if we see him this weekend, that would be great, but it's only been Paul that's been here.
Q. Just on your cunning plan to stop the Americans winning six times in a row, if you were to sum it up, how are you going to beat this very deep American team?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Well, first of all, we're going to master the -- we've got to master the challenges that are in front of us with the golf course. We've got confidence in our preparation, and we have got a game plan, and we'll stick to our game plan.
It's going to be a brilliant Walker Cup match, I'm sure. It's going to be extremely difficult. The Americans are so strong. But we are prepared. We'll be playing our own game, and we'll just see where that takes us.
Q. Stuart, many times around this place, great match play course. What's the key to winning matches around Lahinch do you think?
STUART GREHAN: Play better than your opponents. Look, for me, I think the rough is not that heavy this week, but at the same time you're like zero control of the ball out of it. I think if I prioritise fairways myself, if I was just playing like a singles game and then take it from there, I'm well able to shape the ball and flight it down and stuff like that.
As long as I get the ball in the fairway, I think I have a great chance against anyone.
Q. Eliot, what's your view on the strategy?
ELIOT BAKER: Pretty much the same. Yeah, out there today with the wind so strong, if you hit it off the fairway, you're struggling to control it into the greens. Yeah, fairways are key around here, especially if we get weather like this.
Q. Dean, how different is your strategy -- you don't have to say what it is, but how different is your strategy this time around than it was at Cypress Point?
DEAN ROBERTSON: So Cypress Point was really difficult to prepare for in the fact that it's such a unique golf course. The greens are so undulating and so fast, whereas links golf we are well familiar. We've played it all our lives. The golf course is not really going to change that much between now and Sunday. The wind is up, and the course is relatively receptive, as opposed to when we got on-site at Cypress last year, we were there the weekend before. The greens were moderately receptive. They became brick hard, and they became really baked out.
Any flat-flighted ball, any flat-flighted approach shots, the first bounce was so big there and the greens were so fast, it was very difficult to put the ball into the correct position. Time on task with greens that are north of 13 on the stimpmeter with that sort of slope, yes, the players are playing in the NCAA, but they've certainly not got the experience the U.S. players have got. But the greens now are much more akin to the speed that we would be used to, and we're happy about that.
Q. Do you have a different philosophy coming into here versus what you had in Cypress Point?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Well, fairways and greens. Fairways and greens. That's going to be the game plan this week.
Q. You had said that you may have had a different roster this week if you were playing versus what you played at Cypress Point because of the way the setup at Cypress Point was. How different would your roster have been?
DEAN ROBERTSON: In terms of here?
Q. Yeah.
DEAN ROBERTSON: The roster last year, given it came around one year after, we've got six returning Walker Cuppers, that's quite unique in itself. For the rest of the players, I've watched them extensively and spent the last couple of years getting to know them. We've got -- we've got Ben Bolton, Sam Easterbrook, Josh Hill, and you've got your recently crowned U.S. Amateur champion in Jack Whaley. We're strong. I wouldn't really look to say it would be any different this year than it was last year in terms of selection.
Q. Have you seen the captains' agreement and signed it already?
DEAN ROBERTSON: In terms of --
Q. The captains agreement? Have you seen it and signed it?
DEAN ROBERTSON: What's that?
Q. Usually there's a captains' agreement between the two captains that handles different things.
DEAN ROBERTSON: I don't know what you're talking about.
Q. Why is the Walker Cup important?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Why is it important? Well, I played it in '93, and it's the pinnacle of the amateur game in terms of Great Britain & Ireland versus the U.S. I think as a spectacle, it really is amazing the way the crowds can get so close to the players, and match play is the purest form of the game. It's fantastic.
STUART GREHAN: Can't really add much more to that. Put it this way: I was very, very disappointed last year.
ELIOT BAKER: Yeah, totally agree. It's just the pinnacle of amateur golf, and that's about it.
Q. So you guys are out for a bit of revenge?
STUART GREHAN: Call a spade a spade, yeah. That's what we're here to do, both teams, isn't it. We're trying to win the event, obviously. Yeah.
DEAN ROBERTSON: We've got confidence in our preparation, and if we go out there and play well, we're going to make ourselves very difficult to beat.
Q. Dean, you mentioned fairways and greens. On No. 4, can you relate to the idea of trying to drive it over the hill? And is it something you're leaving up to the players to decide, or do you have input on the decision on that tee shot?
DEAN ROBERTSON: So they're all great players in their own right. I would be more old-school in my approach. I would certainly not be able to carry the Klondyke; that's for sure. But for me, getting control of the golf ball, having it in the fairway, you've then got an opportunity to hit it onto the green. The green on No. 4 is massive. For the players that choose to take that risk to hit it right, they're going to run the risk of getting a lie that they can then play. The players know my thoughts on that. I've given that to them. But they're all fantastic players, and they will make the decisions that need to be made at the time.
Q. That applies to all the holes on the course, that policy essentially?
DEAN ROBERTSON: Pretty much. I'm not here to -- I'm here to try to help them be clear in the decisions that they're making. I'm not here to be making decisions for them. So clarity is a word that we talk about a lot. But again, it's hard enough to play this golf course off the fairways without having to go and play out of the thick wet rough. We've prepared well. Our skills are to be able to control the ball flight in the wind, and we can only do that if we're on the fairway.
Q. Stuart, you've now played the Walker Cup at Cypress and at Lahinch, two vastly different courses. A lot has been made about the GB team having advantage on links; do you feel that when you arrive? Or can you compare the last two years of your feeling going into the event?
STUART GREHAN: Are you asking as a team or personally?
Q. Personally.
STUART GREHAN: Personally, 100 percent, playing a links course now, and I obviously know the course pretty well. Yeah, probably a little bit, but I'm well aware that the American players are very, very good and they're well able to adapt.
But I do feel that, yeah, it is advantageous for me, yeah.
Q. You've got the local caddies on the bag this week and so do the U.S. Team. I'm curious how much you've leaned on them, how much input they've put in. Are they simply carrying bags this week? Are there any specific lines, stories, jokes they've given you the last couple days that stand out?
STUART GREHAN: Yeah, my caddie Martin, he's good fun, good craic. We've had a good time. I'm not going to repeat some of the stories he's told me. We've had some good fun out there. But I ask him the odd bit if I'm really struggling with something.
Yeah, he's kind of getting to know me pretty well over the last few days, so he's doing a good job.
ELIOT BAKER: I think my caddie Daryl has definitely helped me get a lot more comfortable over shots, like some of the lines off the tees whenever we have blind tee shots. Yeah, it's just like we know the golf course now, so it's just that little bit of extra confidence when you're stood over the ball knowing that you're committing to the right line.
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