O'Sullivan and team aim for a 'golfwash'

Golf/Curtis Cup Preview: Just down the road from Formby, in the city of Liverpool, the Fab Four were formed. This weekend, in Formby itself, the Britain and Ireland Curtis Cup team have the opportunity to create a unique Fab Four of their own.

Should they beat the Americans in the two-day match which starts this morning, it will mean that for the first time all four of the international trophies played for by teams from the opposite sides of the Atlantic will reside over here.

The Solheim Cup was won at Barseback in Sweden last year, as was the Walker Cup at Ganton, and the Ryder Cup came this way via The Belfry in 2002.

This week both teams are using the possibility of a "golfwash" as an incentive.

The B&I captain, Monkstown's Ada O'Sullivan, has had a card from Sam Torrance, the Ryder Cup captain, urging her and the team on, while the US captain, Martha Wilkinson Kirouac, said yesterday: "We are using the fact that we are 3-0 down very much as a positive. All my eight players are aware that the Curtis Cup is the only one we hold and we intend to keep it that way."

Yesterday saw several thousand spectators arrive for the final practice rounds, most intent on watching the phenomenal Michelle Wie. But with a strong wind and wrapped up in waterproofs, the 14-year-old from Hawaii was not at her best.

The "WowWie" factor was absent and she was outplayed by her partner, the 20-year-old Liz Janangelo. At the difficult sixth, Wie took the wrong club off the tee and the wrong club for her second and finished up in a bunker 40 yards short of the pin.

Little wonder O'Sullivan wants a weekend of good, strong breezes.

Cup rookies Anne Laing and Ireland's Claire Coughlan will have plenty to cope with today.

The duo are facing Wie and Brittany Lang in the first day foursomes, and the big galleries expected to follow the match will add to the increased pressure Laing and Coughlan will face.

None of this will concern Wie, who has already competed in nine professional tournaments, but O'Sullivan feels her charges will rise to the occasion.

She has also stood by her assertion that some of the players in the American camp were unhappy about star attraction Wie hogging the limelight. Kirouac, her opposite number, has disputed the claim.

Today: Foursomes (Britain and Ireland names first): 8.0 - S McKevitt and E Duggleby v P Creamer and J Park; 8.15 - N Timmons and D Masters v S Huarte and A Thurman; 8.30 - A Laing and C Coughlan v M Wie and B Lang.