Tom McKibbin performed like a veteran as he partnered Tyrrell Hatton to a fourball win over Antoine Rozner and Julien Guerrier and helped Great Britain take a 3.5-1.5 lead over Continental Europe in the Team Cup in Abu Dhabi.
Strongly linked with a shock move to LIV Golf and Jon Rahm’s Legion XIII team alongside Hatton and Caleb Surrat, McKibbin (22) set the tone when he holed a 25-footer for what turned out to be a half in birdies at the first.
The GB&I pair won the second with a birdie four and while they lost the fifth, McKibbin birdied the eighth and Hatton the 10th to put them 2-up before the Newtownabbey man birdied the 14th to extend their lead to three holes and set up a 3&2 win.
“Yeah, it was great,” said McKibbin, who will partner England’s Aaron Rai in tomorrow’s morning foursomes session. “And playing with Tyrrell, who is experienced in these situations, was cool.
“He played lovely and took a little pressure off me on some of the shots.”
Hatton praised McKibbin’s performance at Abu Dhabi Golf Resort, especially with the driver.
“You want to get off to a nice start,” Hatton said. “You don’t really want to be giving holes away early.
“I think we did a really good job of that today. We didn’t drop a shot as a team, which is important. If they won a hole, they earned it by making birdie.
“So yeah, Tom played good. He drove the ball really well, which was — he had a bit more pressure because I was spraying it sideways after the fourth hole or whatever it was. Happy to win a point.”
Francesco Molinari’s Continental Europe team won the opening match with Matthieu Pavon and Romain Langasque beating GB&I skipper Justin Rose and his partner Matt Wallace 3&1.
Jordan Smith and Lauren Canter put GB&I 2-1 up with a 3&2 win over Danes Ramus Hojgaard and Ramus Neergaard-Petersen.
While the other Danish pair, Thorbjorn Olesen and Niklas Norgaard, halved with Matthew Jordan and Paul Waring, Rai and Tommy Fleetwood beat Molinari and Matteo Manassero 4&2 in the anchor match to give GB&I a two-point lead after the first day.
“I’m really, really pleased with that because some of the key messaging is to get off to fast starts, and I did notice there was a little bit too much blue on the board for my liking, which I was contributing, as well,” Rose said.
“But the team rallied well. I thought Laurie and Jordan closed it out beautifully on 17 and 18. And Matty Jordan, nice tricky up-and-down on 18 to halve that match after Thorbjørn’s shots.
“To play the 18th hole well, to make most of today, I would have snapped that up at the beginning of the day.”
As for the Saturday morning foursomes, Rose has mixed up his team with Wallace to partner Hatton against Olesen and Norgaard before he partners Fleetwood against Molinari and Guerrier.
Rai and McKibbin face Hojgaard and Neergaard-Petersen in the third match, before Waring and Jordan face Manassero and Rozer, and Smith and Canter take on Pavon and Langasque.
“Yeah, huge, going into foursomes, which is the trickier format,” Rose said of his team’s performance.
“I don’t think I’m having to hide anybody or come up with a plan for anybody or sort of like try to find one strong guy to kind of prop somebody else up. I really feel like everybody on the team is in good form.
“Obviously foursomes tomorrow, different format, different style of golf, probably one of my favourite styles of golf.
“It’s tricky. So hopefully we can keep the momentum up tomorrow but yeah for my decision-making point of view, I’m very happy.”