Jose Maria Olazabal’s picks for Friday’s opening Ryder Cup foursomes at Medinah Country Club appear to be taking shape by the looks of the second practice round.

Practising together over the front nine in Group Three were Luke Donald and Sergio Garcia alongside Northern Irish duo Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell.

The argument for sending out Donald and Garcia, perhaps in the opening match, are compelling as they are unbeaten in four previous such partnerships.

Englishman Donald has six wins out of six in the alternate-shot format, while Garcia is unbeaten in nine matches.

Just as compelling is the matchup of world No.1 McIlroy and his close friend McDowell as they have been all but joined at the hip since McIlroy made his Ryder Cup debut alongside his older countryman at Celtic Manor two years ago.

With Ian Poulter and Justin Rose hot favourites to also be on duty in the opening session all that would remain to be seen was who Olazabal picks to play alongside his most experienced campaigner Lee Westwood.

The 39-year-old Englishman, who is winning his eighth cap, went out on Wednesday with the oldest man in the team, the in-form Paul Lawrie of Scotland, along with Belgian rookie Nicolas Colsaerts and Francesco Molinari of Italy.

Olazabal, understandably was giving nothing away on who would be in action on Friday morning other than saying he had “a pretty good idea of what I want on Friday morning”.

“I do have a few ideas but I’m not going to tell you anything about that,” he added.

Olazabal also said he had decided to give his 12-man team a restful day on Wednesday with just nine holes, having observed them over the full 18 on Tuesday when they first got acquainted with the remodelled Medinah course.

Asked about his aptitude to play well in the foursomes – he was won eight and halved one in nine games – Garcia said it was all down to who he had been paired with.

“There’s no big secret about it. It’s being able to play well at the right moments – foursomes is the toughest format we play, so being comfortable with who you’re playing I think is key.”

Westwood also enjoys the foursome format and he has a fine record of seven wins, two losses and four halves.

The opening alternate balls on Friday morning, he feels, are key in setting the tone for the weekend.

“Over the last few years, we’ve been quite successful in foursomes, so maybe that’s a bit of an advantage to us for it to be foursomes in the morning.”