All For One And One For All? Versus Aliens.

There is no ‘i’ in team, we’re always told.

There is however, an ‘i’ in individual and one ‘i’ in aliens too. We’ll come back to them later.

The Ryder Cup was played this weekend gone. There’s not usually a huge overlap between football and golf but the team dynamics of this competition got me thinking.

For the record, the golfing competition – dreamt up by Samuel Ryder in the 1920s, on not too dissimilar a timeline to the creation of the Jules Rimet World Cup – was first played in 1927 and is a rare beast in a sport that’s almost entirely for loners; a team event where the players represent their country (or continent in Europe’s case) and go head-to-head in front of fervent, passionate and partisan crowds.

It’s very different to the golf that’s played around the world for all but this weekend window in September every two years. Polite applause for all players – regardless of their nationality – is replaced by cheering for the home side, jeers for the away one. Chanting, including the occasional derogatory remark about the best player on the visiting team, is heard for the one and only time on a golf course. There is occasional poor behaviour from spectators; and from players too sometimes, as the rivalry and inter-continental aspect threatens to boil over.

It sounds remarkably – just for that weekend – like another sport we know and love.

Much has been made of the egos involved in this 42^nd staging of the event, in France for the first time (it’s in Italy in four years’ time and due to come back to Britain at some stage, although what happens after Brexit is anyone’s guess). During the weekend, Team Europe, visibly and metaphorically, left their egos at the door and embraced an all-for-one-and-one-for-all philosophy that was entirely fitting given they were in Paris.

By comparison, Team U.S.A. did not leave their egos at the door. Any Dumas could have told you what happened next.

They and their egos were spread over the course Le Golf National for all to see. Their build up and the weekend itself were punctuated by disharmony between players and a failure to find a team ethos, especially from big-hitters (status not necessarily yardage) who spend the other 700+ days of a two-year cycle in a bubble that is entirely about them.

Thus, star players on paper, mostly serial major winners and higher in the world rankings, failed to deliver points for the pre-match favourites, whereas the Europeans found form from deep within and every single member of the twelve-man team contributed at least a point to their grand total of 17½.

The way they celebrated afterwards (together as players, captain and vice captains and with partners and families) said a lot about the way they viewed the team ethic. No-one was ever more important than the team.

If only Jose Mourinho could call upon some of them for Manchester United.

It’s easy to draw a comparison with the mis-firing Red Devils, but their apparent disarray at the moment is in stark contrast to the togetherness of the European Ryder Cup Team. They could learn a lot from them.

Alexis Sanchez began, if reports are to be believed, of complaining about tactics and his role in the team, as early as the pre-season tour of the United States. He has not played a useful part since, sulking his way from the pitch to the bench and finally, out of the match-day squad altogether.

Ex-vice-captain, Paul Pogba, has undermined the manager at every turn, contradicting and using any press conference or question as an opportunity to unsettle the applecart, without seemingly considering how this might impact on the team or club as a whole.

It has long been an accusation thrown at another star that grew at Manchester United, Cristiano Ronaldo; that his priority is to himself and individual honours first and the team second, but Real’s hat-trick of Champions League wins suggest it hasn’t adversely affected them even if it were true.

Personally, I don’t think it is. CR7 has an individualistic streak, for sure, but not at the expense of the team or the wider goal. He might have a lot of influence, as we saw in the Euro 2016 final when he came off injured and coached the team instead, but it felt like it was his will to win – for his country this time – that trumped his own agenda. That Portugal and Real won major European honours gave him the individual spotlight he craves, but you don’t sense he’d sacrifice those trophies for personal gain.

Can the same be said for United’s current sour-pusses? Are they putting the team’s needs ahead of their own agendas?

If golfers who have to be so selfish in their careers can bond as a team when needed, then surely it’s not that difficult. On Sunday we saw that even Formula 1 drivers can work to a team plan, however much it curbs their win-at-all-costs determination and hunger to be numero uno.

The disconnect between the players, managers, fans and even ex-players with influence is stark at Old Trafford. The highly-paid and expensively acquired Pogba and Sanchez should be demonstrating their commitment, desire, ability and professionalism, on the pitch to drag their club out of its current malaise.

But there lies one of the main issues. Do they even think of it as their club? Or is it just a convenient stop off point on their journey along the career ladder?

Agents hinder by creating a vacuum between the club and their client and – while I’m not naïve to think that the days of a John Terry spending nearly two decades at one club aren’t behind us – if this trend continues then we’ll see players being traded like Panini stickers before too long.

To almost emphasise the individualistic point, last week also saw the third edition of the Best FIFA awards.

There is an award for the best player, best women’s player, best coach – even the best fans – but there isn’t a best team. Some would say that France earned that title this year anyway, winning the World Cup in the summer, but that’s missing the point. And what about other years?

The only ‘teams’ involved in the awards, from what I can see, are the 5 [FIVE] fictitious World XIs they select based on the voting. But this itself created more confusion than Mo Salah’s goal against Everton winning the Puskas Award for the Best Goal (despite it not even being chosen as Match of the Day’s Goal of the Month at the time), ahead of the Bale and Ronaldo bicycle kicks.

For instance, Thibauly Courtois was the best individual goalkeeper but not selected in the First XI (David de Gea was). Dani Alves was the First XI right back despite missing the World Cup and there being a number of right-backs who shone there.

Mo Salah was voted third best player overall, but he didn’t make the First XI either, and neither did FIFA World Cup Golden Boot winner, Harry Kane.

For the record, the First XI was as follows…

David De Gea; Dani Alves, Marcelo, Sergio Ramos, Raphael Varane; Eden Hazard, N’Golo Kante, Luka Modric; Cristiano Ronaldo, Kylian Mbappe, Lionel Messi.

So, would they be any good?

If a team of aliens arrived and challenged us to a game of footy to decide universal dominance, would this XI be the ‘team’ we’d entrust the future of earth to?

I don’t think they’d be bad, and of course it depends on whether the aliens were more Predator or ET, but I’m not sure they’ d necessarily be our best hope as a race. For instance, would they collectively work together – like the three musketeers – or rely on their own strengths to hopefully be enough to get by?

If this match were ever to become reality, I wonder if Team Europe’s golf captain, Thomas Bjorn, could be involved in the selection process. Or even if he might be a better solution to the problems at Manchester United.

It also left me with one final thought…. if these are the Best FIFA Awards, I’d hate to see the worst ones