Ryder Cup captains Keegan Bradley and Luke Donald set to put friendship aside

Ryder Cup captains Keegan Bradley and Luke Donald have vowed to put their friendship to the side as they battle it out for glory this week.

United States captain Bradley and his European counterpart are good friends, having spent a lot of time together off the course over the last 14 years.

But they are on opposite sides at Bethpage Black in New York this week, with first-time captain Bradley trying to win back the title Donald oversaw for Europe in Rome two years ago.

While they spoke lovingly of each other in Monday’s press conference to kick-off the build-up to the hotly-contested tournament, there will be no love lost when the first tee shots are hit on Friday morning.

“For me, there’s not many people I like more in the golf world than Luke Donald,” Bradley said.

“I came on tour in 2011 and he was number one in the world. He was the first real top player to treat me with the respect that I couldn’t believe.

“I got to go out and play with Luke Donald who’s the best player in the world. He played with all of my buddies. I loved hanging out and having a drink with Luke Donald.

“I wanted to be the first one to tell Luke that I’m the Ryder Cup captain here, out of respect to him, because we’ve talked a lot about the Ryder Cup throughout our lives.

“But we want to go out there and win. We want to put our teams in the best position to go out there and do well.

“I really feel lucky to have Luke on the opposite side. Because we send each other texts, we joke around, but we know once the competition comes, we want to win.”

Donald insisted he would sit down for a drink with Bradley on Sunday night, whatever the result.

“I’ve known Keegan (for) 12, 13 years now. We sometimes play practice rounds together on the road, we’ve had dinners together, we have mutual friends,” the 47-year-old said.

“Again, Keegan is someone that I’ve rooted for. If he did well in a tournament, won a tournament, I would text him.

“And likewise, I think we definitely have a good strong friendship and I think there’s a mutual respect there.

“We understand both being in the arena. We understand exactly the difficulties of professional golf and we celebrate our victories together, I think.

“It’s nice to have a captain – your captain opposite you – someone that you know and respect a lot. I think we’re also very, very competitive and that’s not going to change this week.

“I think we’ll have a drink on Sunday night no matter what the result, but this week is about trying to get our teams to win and we want to win.”