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The first tee at the Ryder Cup has long been a focus of intense scrutiny. <\/b><\/p>\n
For players, the nerves are tested as they hit their opening shots in front of thousands of partisan supporters.<\/p>\n
The boisterous buzz makes it an essential part of the day for fans, who arrive in morning darkness to stake their spot, while latecomers, irked at missing out, slope off down the fairway.<\/p>\n
The Bethpage Black offering this week is shaped by the topography of the course. It will accommodate 5,000 people, slightly more than in Rome two years ago, but certainly fewer than the 6,500 that fitted in the Paris behemoth in 2018.<\/p>\n
And rather than the intimidatory three-sided horseshoe shape of two years ago, this vast stand “looks more London Stadium than Upton Park”, according to BBC Sport’s golf correspondent Iain Carter. <\/p>\n
From down in the fairway, it resembles a giant draught excluder, skirting the back of the tee and adjacent 18th green.<\/p>\n
The horseshoe element has been lost and, through that, has the advantage for the home team suffered?<\/p>\n
“The way it’s set up, it’s a little bit further back than what we’ve had over the past few years,” Tommy Fleetwood told BBC Sport.<\/p>\n
“But it’s still the first tee at a Ryder Cup and we’ll still come away from this week with stories of first tee nerves.<\/p>\n
“It’s something that you’ve got to embrace. I think it’s a cool scene.”<\/p>\n
In 2023 the first tee was a cauldron of noise and colour.<\/p>\n
Thousands of fans crammed into stands that towered above the players, with music blaring and European fans welcoming each player on to the tee with their own unique song.<\/p>\n
While the European players revelled in that racket, it seemed to serve up too much of a claustrophobic start to matches for the US team, who did not win the first hole in any of the opening 12 matches.<\/p>\n
It does not feel like that level of claustrophobia will be part of this week, but the fans on the practice days have been good-naturedly engaging in the ‘phoney war’.<\/p>\n
A chorus of pantomime boos rang out across Bethpage Black as Rory McIlroy strode on to the first tee for a practice round. <\/p>\n
The stand was around one-quarter full, but the jeers seemed to drift aimlessly over Europe’s number one as he cheerily waved back, before heading off down the fairway, obligingly signing autographs as he went. <\/p>\n
It was the European charm offensive in full swing.<\/p>\n
But as Fleetwood, 34, pointed out: “No matter what you do, nothing prepares you for a Friday morning on the first tee of the Ryder Cup.”<\/p>\n
Europe’s only rookie Rasmus Hojgaard is expecting his first tee experience to be “my most nervous moment” of the week.<\/p>\n
American Bryson DeChambeau gave a glimpse of perhaps what might follow as he indulged the fans who wanted to see him reach the green 397 yards away, by smashing half a dozen tee shots.<\/p>\n
There were accompanying shouts from the stands of “Rory can’t do that”.<\/p>\n
Two-time US Open champion DeChambeau – the only member of the US team to play on the LIV Golf circuit – is the perfect showman, basking in the adulation, while demanding his followers further crank up the volume.<\/p>\n
Not that the home support, as history has shown, necessarily needs the encouragement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n