A handshake with Clinton on the golf course

It was all there at the K Club last weekend — just what it had always said on the tin

It was all there at the K Club last weekend — just what it had always said on the tin. The passion, the best golf and golfers in the world, a glorious setting, rain, sweat and tears, an emphatic triumph for Europe and, of course, the craic. I was on the front row of the barrier overlooking the 16th green on Sunday — where I had stood for four hours — and shook the hand of Bill Clinton as he walked to the scene of the denouement. A short time later I shook hands with Henrik Stenson, the Swede who, moments earlier and cheekily against the ‘script’, had just clinched the Ryder Cup for Europe by 4&3 at the 15th. Then we all watched in the lush silence as Darren Clarke won his match and became the first king of a united Ireland.