This is a good picture of an outstanding team and I think that the combination is powerful enough to allow it to transcend as a piece of sporting memorabilia. Time will tell, but my early sense is that it could become one of the most coveted pictures of my career. There is an old platitude that the best photographs tend to unfold when good stuff is in front of the lens and this single frame endorses that principle. The true essence of being a team is played out against the most emphatic sense of place conceivable. When I look at the image - as I do every day - I just can’t help smiling; perhaps in recognition that the months of logistical planning were rewarded and also because the weather at Brooklyn that appointed morning was generous to us. There was no Plan B.

Above that, I feel the investment and thought that went into the dressing of the players, the captain and vice captains and caddies paid great dividends. We cut no corners in the individual stylings and consequently everyone was invested in the end result. You win the caddies over and you win the crowd. I want to thank Nicole Allowitz and her styling team for their talent and care.

But most of all, I recognise the extreme privilege of knowing every single member in this extraordinary collective of people. History will remind us that they unequivocally proved that in the best teams, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Everyone in this picture had earned the right to be at Bethpage and I sensed, from the moment we gathered in New York 10 days before the tournament, that there was a cohesive vibe that united and glued them together. Egos were long left behind and that is the hallmark of a captain as strong as Luke Donald.

To win the Ryder Cup away from home is empirically tough. This European Team achieved that, but they did so in the daunting bearpit of New York and that surely gives the story added weight.

Once upon a time in America ….

Monies from the sales of this print will be deployed to causes close to the hearts of everyone that made this picture possible. It was a proud moment in my journey as an artist.