By Martin Dempster

Copyright scotsman

Bob MacIntyre is sitting in a room in the BMW PGA Championship media centre at Wentworth that only had a table and some chairs in it. “You know what this looks like?,” joked his manager, Iain Stoddart, with MacIntyre instantly being on the same wavelength as, bursting out into loud laughter, he replied: “No comment. I want my solicitors!” It was a perfect example of how relaxed the Oban man is heading into his second successive Ryder Cup appearance, as was another quip as Brian McLauchlin, the well-known BBC Scotland sports reporter, tried to clip a microphone on MacIntyre’s polo shirt for a post-round interview during the Rolex Series event at the Surrey venue. “It’s only the BBC – no-one will see it,” he joked on this occasion. MacIntyre laughed loudly the following day when someone else cheekily quipped within McLauchlin’s earshot that it had actually been watched by 22 viewers, with all of that providing a snapshot of the man who might get hot and bothered at times on the golf course but loves to have some fun off it. Two years ago, when he was one of four rookies in the European team for the match at Marco Simone Golf Club on the outskirts of Rome, MacIntyre was a two-time DP World Tour winner and, helped by playing alongside an experienced campaigner like Justin Rose in his two fourball appearances, ended up unbeaten as Luke Donald’s side regained the coveted trophy with an impressive 16.5-11.5 victory. Even so, he probably still had a point to prove in Donald’s eyes after the Englishman was reappointed for a defence in the event’s 45th edition at Bethpage Black on Long Island – but not now. Not after he won twice on the PGA Tour last season. Not after he came close to winning the US Open this year. And not with him currently sitting in the world’s top ten. “It was a bit daunting,” admitted MacIntyre, speaking exclusively to Scotland on Sunday, of how he felt heading into the 2023 match, which saw him become the 23rd player from the home of golf to represent either Great Britain & Ireland or Europe in the transatlantic tussle and the first since Stephen Gallacher at Gleneagles in 2014. “Although you are not meant to feel like an outsider, you kind of do. And that is natural for me when you are going into a new environment. Just through my personality, I’m not going to march in there with my chest out and look around saying ‘I’m here’. I’m going to kind of sneak around and slowly find my feet. That’s how it felt in Rome. Obviously I knew all of them but I didn’t know them on much of a personal level. But everyone was brilliant there. Then the last two years I’ve obviously been on the PGA Tour and seen them more, spent more time with them. Aye, you just feel far more prepared for what is to come this year.” The previous day, during pre-event press conferences, career grand slam winner Rory McIlroy had talked about MacIntyre now being “one of the best players in the world” while FedEX Cup champion Tommy Fleetwood spoke about him being “such an asset to the European team in the Ryder Cup”. Responding to those comments, MacIntyre said: “I think it is good for everyone. We’ve got such a strong team. Yes, statistically the Americans might have better players on paper. But we’ve got a solid core in our team. The combinations will maybe change a little bit from Rome, but it’s the same guys going into the same battle and we know that we’ve got each other’s backs. “It is always nice to hear the guys you have looked up to – almost idols, I suppose, in Rory – say nice things about you. What Rory is doing in the game is unbelievable and, if I had a quarter of his career, I’d be delighted. But to hear people like that speak highly of you, it definitely gives you extra motivation because they are recognising you.” One of the biggest challenges for the European players in this Ryder Cup will be a raucous New York crowd, with Donald having handed out virtual reality handsets to his players to help get them ready for whatever the Americans fans have in store for them. During the BMW Championship, one of the PGA Tour’s Play-Off events, MacIntyre gestured to a spectator who was giving him stick as he played with Scottie Scheffler during the third round at Caves Valley in Maryland, leading Donald to say that he hopes the Scot can use the “fire in his belly in the right way” at the Ryder Cup. “I’ve been working on it,” insisted MacIntyre of how he will be trying to stop himself from engaging with the crowd at Bethpage Black. “At the BMW Championship, it felt like 99 per cent of people were against me on the Saturday and the Sunday, which is understandable. But I feel like I took a lot from that. As much as though I was absolutely livid with my performance over the weekend (finishing second to Scheffler after taking a four-shot lead into the final round) and didn’t get the result I was looking for, I learnt so much in what I was doing. “When I sat down with the people around me and we spoke about it, we asked what I did on Saturday and Sunday that was different from earlier in the week. And then we asked what we don’t want to do going to Bethpage because it is going to be the same type of atmosphere, albeit elevated. We’ve had good discussions and there will be more before the start on Friday. But, once it starts, it is team versus team and just try and play your best golf.” With that, this correspondent’s time with him in that sparse room was over, though his fun side came out again before leaving. “No comment,” he replied, laughing, to being asked if all was well with his family back in Oban and he knew, of course, that his jocular tone wouldn’t cause offence.