This week the European Tour headed to glorious Perthshire in Scotland and a newish, and not so glorious, American-style golf course built as an addition to magnificent, and old, King’s and Queens’s courses at Gleneagles.

The Johnnie Walker Championship was the final qualifying event for October’s Ryder Cup at (no surprise here) a new resort course in South Wales - but it will be a long time before the Ryder Cup returns to a golf course that is remotely close to traditional because the event funds so much of the tour and new courses eager for legitimacy and publicity rule the day.

At the end of the championship, the European team captain Colin Montgomerie was due to announce his three wild-card selections to complete his 12-man team. These ‘picks’ are the preserve of the Captain and are designed to ensure famous players who may not have qualified by right make their way onto the team.

The Ryder Cup is second only to The Open Championship in terms of importance to European golf and the selection process is much more complicated than it once was because so many of Europe’s best players compete in the United States. The players closest and therefore most reliant on the captain’s patronage, Luke Donald, Padriag Harrington, Justin Rose and Paul Casey, played almost all season in America and despite good play they were not high enough on either the European points list or the world rankings to earn an automatic place.

To illustrate the rise of European golf, Casey is ninth and Donald is 10th on the world rankings but behind Lee Westwood, Rory McIlroy, Martin Kaymer and Graeme McDowell and so there was no automatic place for the two Englishmen.

The only topic of discussion at Gleneagles this week revolved around who Montgomerie would choose to add to his team of Westwood, McIlory, Ian Poulter, Kaymer, McDowell, Ross Fischer, Francesco Molinari (who might have the most solid swing in the game), Peter Hansen and the Spanish veteran Miguel Angel Jimenez.

Essentially he was confronted with a choice between the other Molinari (Edoardo), Casey, Rose, Harrington and Donald.

Should he reward Molinari for making a sustained effort to make the team by playing in Europe despite having more chances to play in America after he finished second (his brother was ninth) at Bay Hill in March?

Should he go with the experienced men who made almost no effort to make his job easier by playing just a little more in Europe in order to secure their places?

Complicating matters for Montgomerie was that his American-based players were all doing well at Ridgewood in the first of the four playoff events that finish up the main part of the season. Rose shot a 65 on Saturday and were he to finish third or better, he would move to the head of the American money list. Montgomerie’s problem was that he had to announce his picks live on Sky Television just past six o’clock – long before Rose and company were finishing up across the ocean.

The Molinaris, playing together in the final group at Gleneagles, were grinding toward the title on a difficult day where the course, almost indistinguishable from anything on mid-west America, was taking its toll. It is long and soft with thick green grass surrounding fairways and greens and it is especially difficult in a wind, especially a cold Scottish wind at the end of the summer – or what passes for summer over here.

The West Australian, Brett Rumford, did his best to attract the attention away from the selection battle and he came to the over-the-water par five 16th close to the lead and hit a perfect pitch that crashed into the base of the flag and came back all the way to the front of the green from where he could only two putt for his par.

A two at the next, courtesy of a long putt, did him no harm and he came up the last fairway needing a birdie four for 279 and that looked like being good enough to hold out the Italian brothers behind. He duly pitched from 50 metres and putted from a couple of paces for his four and a target that looked easily good enough.

Rumford has worked hard on his game for years now and it has never looked better and whilst almost all the Australian attention is on America and how our players are doing there he is one who grinds away in some anonymity but is deserving of more praise.

The Molinari needing the pick, Edoardo, meanwhile came back from a desperate position after he bogeyed the short par-four 14th hole with birdies at the 16th and 17th holes and a four at the last would be 278 and a difficult scenario for Montgomerie who, you assume, was more than eager to pick those more famous playing in New Jersey.

Edoardo played the last hole perfectly – two good strong woods up to the very front of the green and a pitch to a foot - and stole the event from Rumford with his brilliant three-birdie finish.

What would the Captain do? Would he go with the establishment or would be pick a new man playing his first full season on the tour and one more than deserving of his place?

The seven-time order of merit winner fronted the press at the announced time and without any dragging of the task at hand he added Harrington, Donald and Molinari to his team.

Molinari’s finish, Monty said, was ‘the best I have seen under that pressure in 25 years on the tour.’ Harrington has an atrocious record in the Ryder Cup – he has not won a match since 2004 – but three recent major championship wins secured his case and Donald, in contrast, has a brilliant record and in a limited run of events in Europe early in the summer he was first, second and third.

The final act before the event is the finalisation of the American side by Corey Pavin.

He already has Phil Mickelson, Hunter Mahan, Bubba Watson, Dustin Johnson, Jim Furyk, Steve Stricker, Jeff Overton (the first American Ryder Cup player never to have won a tournament) and Matt Kuchar.

Pavin gets four picks and does anybody think he is going to leave out Tiger Woods?

The rest are all much the same – Zack Johnson, Anthony Kim and Lucas Glover are the next on the points list – but the Europeans will head to Wales as the overwhelming favourites and that is a reflection of the strength of the game, and the quality of the play in Europe.