Friday Press Conference With GB&I Captain Mary McKenna

ST. ANDREWS, SCOTLAND

STEWART McDOUGALL: Mary, thank you for coming across. Give us your reaction. You had quite a tough day, both weather-wise and in terms of playing conditions.
MARY McKENNA: Reaction has been great. The standard of golf has been absolutely wonderful and would love to have got the extra match this afternoon just so that we would go in 3-3 which would give us a great boost. But I have to say the standard of golf that was played out there was just super.

Q. Do you think a little bit of wind this weekend would have helped you?
MARY McKENNA: I think a little bit of wind out there would help us, but there's still 14 points to be played for, so we're still very much in the hunt. I think the girls will come out fine tomorrow and be really kind of anxious to get going, get another couple of wins under their belt.

Q. What will you remember most about this morning other than the disappointment?
MARY McKENNA: We were up in the two matches this morning for a while and then it turned. Liz's match, Liz and Jodi's match, turned at around the turn. I think the last match there were three birdies in the first four holes shot against them, and suddenly they were on the back foot very early and it was very hard. They made a hell of a comeback, being 5-down at one stage, and they came back. With a little bit of luck, if they would have got a halve there on 18, it would have been fantastic. And I think that set them going. The golf is there, it's just a matter of them kind of producing it.
And then in Liz and Jodi's match they got hit with kind of a barrage of birdies at around the turn and just kind of never were able to kind it get it back. It's hard with kind of only halved holes.

Q. I have to ask, was there a particular reason why Breanne Loucks -- I know she had a bit of back trouble, but she practised here. Was there any reason, because obviously she's the most experienced on your side. Did she not play too well this morning?
MARY McKENNA: No, they all played well, but I have to drop two and bring two other people in, and I just felt that the combinations were going to be stronger that way than with Breanne. I mean, it really was no reflection on either the way herself or Jodi played, but I wanted to bring the two other players in, and that was the way the combination fell. She's back in in the morning. I'm putting Carly and herself in tomorrow morning.

Q. You spoke a little bit about Sally, and she was involved in getting both your points today. Can you talk about that?
MARY McKENNA: I think Sally is a very mature young player, and she has got a tremendous array of golf shots. She hit a shot into 17 there -- or into 16, off a downhill grassy rough lie onto the green. She's just a very talented player, and she's very positive, she's focused. She's very positive.

Q. And then the putt she holed in the morning when the match was -- they were making a charge and it ebbed away from them but they still --
MARY McKENNA: Yeah, they just didn't let go. It was great. The thing Michele and herself and the thing Krystle and herself kind of gel well together. She's a very talented player.

Q. (Inaudible.)
MARY McKENNA: This morning, yes. Oh, fabulous, especially having to follow in the American shot, which was very good. She played a super shot. I said to her, is this an amateur cup, because I haven't looked.

Q. Still about Sally, could you detail what she brings to the team room?
MARY McKENNA: She's very positive, and like everything she talks about, as far as she talks positive, she's good crack.
I think as a unit they all bring their own uniqueness and there's good banter between them all. I think probably just the fact that she is so positive about the game and about everything we do, you know, it takes the positives out of things, and that's just got to give the girls a great help.

Q. Do you feel you have to be ahead tomorrow night in order to stay ahead through the singles?
MARY McKENNA: We have 14 points to play for now, and we've got to get as many as we have. We're under no illusion that the American girls are super golfers. You only have to look at their records and you know how they play. But I do think that we can beat them. We can take each match as it comes. Yes, I certainly would love to be ahead, as many ahead, as possible tomorrow. But certainly I don't really want to go any further backwards.
But I think the girls will come out of the traps tomorrow and get going again. But it would, it would be nice to get as many points tomorrow and be ahead, definitely, yeah, give them that extra boost.

Q. But it wouldn't be the end of the world if you were still one point behind?
MARY McKENNA: No, absolutely not, because you've still eight points to play for.

 Q. Have you thought about your message to the players tonight, what you're going to say to them?
MARY McKENNA: Other than the fact that, no, we have 14 points to play for, very much so. I am very, very pleased with the standard of golf, and I think everybody looking there is amazed at the standard of golf, and it really is -- it's just mindboggling to the people out there. The figures have been super.

Q. They will be down a bit, won't they?
MARY McKENNA: I think, yes, they're disappointed, yes, but I think between themselves, they bring themselves up. I think within themselves that they would get themselves going. They know they can go out and win the matches, they know they could have won those matches today with the slightest little bit of luck going our way, because that was the only difference, and I think they will be geared up and ready to go.
They're here for a reason and they know that, and they'll go and give it everything again.
STEWART McDOUGALL: Mary, thank you very much.

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