Whichever birthday you celebrate this year, please make a wish when blowing out your candles: serenity for Ian Poulter.
The LIV rebel, an epithet which makes fading blokes sound significantly cooler than they are, turned 47 on Tuesday. Most of us stopped caring about non-round number birthdays in our 20s. No such growth from Poulter.
On Tuesday the Ryder Cup’s European team Twitter account posted a tasty approach shot from Francesco Molinari noting his “incredible touch”. So far so innocuous, but not so for Poulter who was enraged enough to respond.
What could be more petty than failing to acknowledge a birthday? Answer: Pointing out a failure to acknowledge a birthday. But let us be clear here, it is not Poulter’s snub he cares about. It is Garcia’s which pushed him over the edge. As of Monday, the unsuspecting Garcia turned 43. All he wanted was a digital balloon. Cheers @RyderCupEurope, Sergio's crying.
As ever your sympathies should go to the employee given the turbo-thankless job of populating the Ryder Cup Europe's social media with suitably inane pictures, videos, words and emoji. Everyone on the internet expects the worst in the replies, but Poulter took bad faith to new levels. Here’s a video of Francecsco Molinari, but what about a card and a badge for Sergio Garcia?! It is a straw man so large it should be on a Hebridean island, incinerating a police sergeant.
From here some goading from frequent thorn in the Saudi side Eddie Pepperell, many similar dunks from fans and the odd toadying fella dutifully wishing Poulter the many happy returns he so clearly desired.
His anger brought to mind Yaya Toure’s fuss over Manchester City's lack of a ‘happy birthday’ when he turned 31. At least Toure got a cake.
Poulter has never been blessed with a great awareness of propriety, so no real surprise about this outburst. What he has failed to understand is that Faustian pacts come with a code of silence. You don’t go parading your anger about minor slights from the golf establishment when you’ve taken the rivals’ money.
Lionel Messi keeps his own counsel about matters of Middle Eastern politics, it is part of the deal when you sign up to be a tourism ambassador for Saudi Arabia. In fairness, that’s a tough gig. Come to Riyadh: The beheadings aren't great, but get a load of these shopping malls!
Any reasonable person can understand the PGA’s attitude with regards to the LIV mob. It is a simple rule, LIV and let die, taking the same stance that the nostalgia-driven festive singles chart has for Another Rock and Roll Christmas by Gary Glitter.
Pondering Poulter’s motivation is more complex. “It’s only business, right? Business and personal are two completely different things,” he said as recently as July last year. The slight's originator must have particularly rankled. He is unlikely to ever win the elusive major but he is the Ryder Cup’s great pumper of fists, one of its great emblems in the 21st century. His magnetism at the competition is so profound Michael Jordan followed him around Medinah in 2012, attempting, unsuccessfully, to psych him out.
So this tactless intervention feels unbecoming, unworthy of a golfer who generated such goodwill for his exploits on the European team. Focus instead on his many golden Ryder Cup moments: five overall victories, winning all four of his matches at Medinah, and his first appearance at Oakland Hills 2004 with a peroxide proto-mullet.
Remember him this way, because @RyderCupEurope most certainly will not.
The Ryder Cup forgot Ian Poulter's and Sergio Garcia's birthdays – now it is personal
Ian Poulter took umbrage at a lack of a birthday greeting for himself and Sergio Garcia – two LIV rebels who, he feels, deserve more