WELL, the Ryder Cup certainly didn’t disappoint, did it?

Three days of top quality matchplay golf resulting in a comfortable European victory – but more importantly the event was an excellent advert for the sport.

Of course, I would prefer to see the event screened on terrestrial television, getting it out there to even more people. However, I’m sure you’re bored with reading me argue my case on that subject already, and I was impressed by the quality of the highlights programme on BBC.

I’m sceptical of golf highlights and still maintain that watching an event live is much preferable. However, I was glued to the highlights on all three evenings, despite already knowing the scores.

Anyway, I digress from what was supposed to by my main point, which was to highlight Justin Rose’s outstanding contribution to the European cause.

If you look back at last week’s edition of Boyman on Sport, you will see that I had a feeling that Rose could be a key player for Europe.

However, even I would not have predicted him going unbeaten and securing four points over the course of the weekend, and that was about the only bit that I did get right!

Pairing Rose with Henrik Stenson was a stroke of genius from European captain Paul McGinley. Guess it’s a good job I’ll never be a Ryder Cup captain, because I would have had Rose playing with a miss-firing Ian Poulter in the foursomes, though I still maintain that Rose and Rory McIlroy would make a fantastic fourballs partnership. Maybe next time.

I also feel that I owe Justin (yes, first name terms. We did meet once, after all) an apology. Last week I described him as a solid player, unlikely to go on a terrific run of birdies.

He certainly proved me wrong last week. He and Stenson’s 12-under-par total for the 16 holes they played in the Saturday fourballs was a Ryder Cup record, while Rose made four consecutive birdies to peg Hunter Mahan back in the singles on Sunday.

That run included one of the shots of the weekend as Rose managed to get his ball to within a couple of feet from the hole from a gorse bush 150 yards away. An amazing shot and, for once, I was only too happy to be wrong.

Basingstoke Gazette:

WAYNE Rooney was rightly shown a red card for a cynical and high challenge on West Ham’s Stuart Downing at the weekend, sparking a wave of hysteria.

As I drove home from Bridgwater, where I had been covering Basingstoke Town, the airwaves were full of irate callers quick to call for Rooney to be replaced as captain of both Manchester United and England.

Having seen the challenge, I can’t help but think that there was a pretty big over-reaction to it.

First things first, it’s undoubtedly a challenge that deserved a red card. You can’t make a thigh-high tackle with the ball barely in shot.

However, it’s a world away from some of Rooney’s earlier misdemeanours. He didn’t stamp on anybody, as he did to Ricardo Carvalho in the 2006 World Cup and it wasn’t a petulant kick like the one that ruled him out of the first two games of Euro 2012.

With West Ham breaking, Rooney attempted to make a professional foul to stop the attack. He was accepting a yellow card for the benefit of the team, and while he got the challenge horribly wrong, I really don’t think there was any malice in it.

Basingstoke Gazette:

IT’S been a bad week for Basingstoke RFC, who have been deducted 15 points after admitting to fielding an unregistered player under a false name in their game against Guildford last month.

It is obviously the biggest sports story in north Hampshire this week, and one I didn’t feel I could ignore in this column, but I will keep most of my opinions to myself until the club’s investigation comes to an end and the full facts become clear.

What is already clear is that a pretty terrible decision was made by at least one person on the Saturday afternoon in question.

It’s left a club with a hitherto good reputation under a cloud, and the repercussions could be felt for a while yet.