Alliss Blog: We're excited to begin, and have some fun

Gary Alliss was shocked to be selected as Great Britain and Ireland's captain, he admits in this edition of his exclusive PGA Cup blog. Now that he's here, his strategy is to get all his players engaged, and balance their excitement with calm. 

By Gary Alliss, Great Britain & Ireland Team Captain

GREENSBORO, Ga. -- First of all, being the captain of the Great Britain and Ireland side for the 23rd PGA Cup is a fantastic honor. I was amazed. You could have knocked me down with a feather.

The way that it happened is this -- Sandy Jones is our chief executive for the Professional Golfers' Association. I was working away at The Belfry, where I'm the head pro, just doing the day job and doing the coaching that I do. I had a message, "Can you ring Sandy?"

The first thing that sprung into my mind was that I've got 32 pros who work under me, and I've gone, "Gee, one of them has done something wrong here!" You know, because I've got the chief executive chasing me.

So I ring his mobile, "Sandy, it's Gary."

He said, "Look, the board has met and they would like me, on their behalf, to invite you to be captain of the PGA Cup side."

And he got total silence.

Then I asked, "Could you say that again, Sandy?"

He said, "I know it is a bit of a shock, but there's no other way of doing it. You've just got to come straight out with these things."

I told him, "But I've never played. I've never been on one of these teams." I had been on a couple of committees and trained our assistants for years and years, but generally the captain of the PGA Cup side has been a past player. I would have loved to play, but I was never good enough to get a spot on the side.

But Sandy told me that the board was looking to go in a slightly different direction.

Immediately I wanted to do it, but I had to check the date. As it was, the Quinn Direct British Masters is being played at The Belfry this week -- which aside from the Open Championship is one of the premier European Tour events we have each year.

I had to make sure that the owners of The Belfry would be OK with me coming here to Reynolds Plantation. The owners were fantastic and told me, yes, I could accept the captaincy.

I got that call 13 months ago and have been excited ever since.

Reynolds Plantation, as a whole, what a magnificent place. Anyone who hasn't discovered Reynolds, they need to. It is truly, truly wonderful. What Mercer and Jamie Reynolds have created and are creating here is fantastic.

Funny enough, I must just tell you, my dad (BBC commentator Peter Alliss, an eight-time Ryder Cup team member for the Europeans) asked where the PGA Cup was being played after I was named captain. I told him Reynolds Plantation, figuring it might just be one place the old man has never heard of. Then he said, "I made another great Alliss decision."

I said, "Oh yeah, what's that, dad?"

He said, "I made a great Alliss decision. I was offered a plot of land at Reynolds for peanuts. Literally a few bucks, really. Silly, silly money. And I said, 'Why do I want to buy a plot of land in the middle of a load of pine trees on the edge of a lake where I'm never going to go?'"

Good decision, wasn't it? Not really. This place is beautiful.

I came out here for a couple of days in May, but now that we're here, the team thinks this is just awesome. It really is fantastic. Everybody here, the staff of the hotel, the golf course from the top man to the person who sweeps out the locker room, has been fantastic. Our caddies have been wonderful. Obviously they are Americans, but they absolutely want us to win. They've really latched into that. The whole atmosphere has been wonderful.

I asked my father, as well as a couple of other past captains from Ryder Cups for advice -- I suppose that I've been fortunate to be able to speak to a few -- but a lot of the advice has been the same. At the end of the day you have to live with the decision that you make. We'll sink or swim by those decisions.

I've heard all of the usual cliches you'd expect, like keeping the guys loose and not letting them get ahead of themselves, but once you get here all those things are true. People have been doing that for as long as the game has been really competitive.

The first thing my dad said when I told him I was captain was, "You don't need a vice captain, do you?"

I would have loved for him to be here, but with the British Masters this week I didn't think the BBC would allow him the week off. I spoke to him this morning; I spoke to my stepmother this morning, my own son who has actually just turned pro as well having finished university, so they've got a feel of where we are. My dad sent all the guys good wishes and we've had lovely messages from Nick Faldo, who is the captain of next year's European Ryder Cup team, and lots of friends.

We're excited about the matches starting. On our side we only have two players who have played in a PGA Cup before, so we have eight people who haven't. That said, we do have a couple of very experienced players. I've got a surface of riches because they've all played great in practice.

My strategy, if there is one, was to save a couple of my calmer players for the afternoon session so that the younger guys don't get into a stew. I'd rather start the less experienced players early to get that under their belt. All 10 will have given it a whack by 2 o'clock on Friday afternoon.

It's going to be fun.