WGC WORLD CUP

November 21, 2004

Padraig Harrington

Paul McGinley

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: Okay. We had a great run at it, and you know, the guys obviously played fantastic, both Spain and England.

Q. The way you knuckled down with the birdies on the first two holes, especially the approach into the 450-yard 2nd to 12 inches.

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: And we carried it on from there. It was good momentum. We kept playing well and hitting good shots. We were getting most out of the round all the way through. We were pushing awfully hard at the end, and it's tough in that situation. You know, you've got to keep making the birdies, and you know, the putt missing on 15, and then obviously 16 and 17, that's the way the game goes. Sometimes it's very hard when you're pushing it all the time to keep the breaks going in your way.

Q. You should have seen the breaks that England got.

PAUL McGINLEY: -- inaudible -- then I hit a perfect drive down the hole and it kicks left, but that putt has got no chance. That was just a killer blow. That was a killer blow, again resulting from a good shot. The Golfing Gods, said "No, it's not your turn, Ireland." It's hard to take but that's the standard of golf.

I hit it right down the pin on 15 and I can't hit a better golf shot. For the yardage I played, it should have been stiff and it four yards short, with an 8-iron, 151 yards. On days that you win, those things finish two feet away and you tap it in for birdie. But that's what it came down to in the end.

If it came down to any hole in the week it was that damn 16, cost us a double-bogey, and we only made par today. The 16th hurt us. We basically gave the field a three-shot start by taking a 7 there the second day, and we were behind the 8-ball the rest of the time. We played our heart out the last two days and yet we have not made any ground up.

Q. Do you take your hat off in a way to what Donald and Casey have done in foursomes?

PAUL McGINLEY: The first day, I'll say it again, Paul Casey is a real streaky putter. There's nobody hotter with a putter when he gets confident in the world of golf than Paul Casey, and he's obviously had a streak this week. He's done all the putting again today. It's not coincidence, the way the course is set up, the guy who does a lot of the putting -- and Paul has obviously holed a lot of putts today to shoot the score to do it.

Q. What's next for you?

PAUL McGINLEY: I really don't know. I'll have to make a decision late on, but at the moment -- at the moment I think my good instinct is to get my operation done and over with and prepare for next season. Only problem is if I don't finish in the Top 50 for the Match-Play, it would be nice to be in the 64 so I could plan my start of the season. But I think I need it take care of my ailing body after a along year.

Q. How deep is the disappointment, Padraig?

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: It's nice after we've gone a few years now where we haven't really contented, so we contended all week. You know, okay, we didn't get breaks here in the week but it certainly could have been our week.

Certainly England has done great to shoot the score they have. As I said it looks like it's their time. Sometimes that's the nature of golf. Sometimes you do need things to happen the at right time.

Q. If somebody had said 65 for you today, would you thought that might have been good enough?

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: Oh, yeah, yeah, definitely. No question about it. It would have been very easy for the leading teams to go out there and shoot 70. Even 69 would be a decent return. You know, so yeah, we would have been very pleased, and to be honest we were pushing at the end. I think we could have even been one better if we were leading in that sort of situation; we had to go for it at the end.

We knew we were in it. We had a 15-footer on 15, I was telling it to break and it missed on the low side. I really thought I would hole that. And obviously 16 was disappointing not to make birdie there. And the approach on 17, trying to go to the back right pin in a left-to-right win can be a tough shot at times.

Q. Do you agree with Paul that the 16th was your nemesis this week; that hole you could have done better?

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: We played it level par, where you would hope to play it 5-under. But we had other good holes. If anything, you would say 15, 16, but it's obviously England's week. They holed the putts. They are the perfect foursomes combination on this golf course. Never has a foursome combination ever been -- this golf course is so one-sided, and they absolutely picked the perfect combination.

Q. Better in foursomes than they are in four-ball.

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: They are better in foursomes and singles anyway. They are just the perfect combination anyway. Paul is a very streaky putter, he's a long hitter; and Luke is probably one of the best iron players in the game, so just perfect. So the golf course really sets up, and they did well in that.

Q. Were you looking at the leaderboards?

PADRAIG HARRINGTON: Yeah, I was looking at the leaderboards on 12, got us going again on 13 and 14. We were pushing it the last couple of holes. It's hard to do that. I think we got every bit you could get out of the round for the first 14 holes, and probably the last four holes we didn't.

End of FastScripts.