Justin Rose is hoping to use all he has learned from 17 years of Ryder Cup battles when he leads Great Britain & Ireland against Continental Europe at the Team Cup this week.
The Englishman is getting his first taste of captaincy in team match play having been a player in six Ryder Cup - with four wins - under Sir Nick Faldo, José María Olazábal, Paul McGinley, Darren Clarke, Thomas Bjørn and Luke Donald.
Donald will be overseeing both teams this week as he reprises his role as Ryder Cup Captain for Bethpage Black later this year and as a player still in the top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking, Rose will no doubt be looking to impress inside the ropes in search of a seventh appearance in New York.
But the spotlight will shine brightest on him as skipper at Abu Dhabi Golf Club and it is a role that Rose is not taking lightly.
"It's a honour, first and foremost," he said. "I think it's been something that's sort of been on my mind.
"Sometimes you play as a player and you're obviously preparing all the time for tournaments that come up.
"But when you have something like this looming large, you start thinking about it months in advance: what do I want to say? Are there any good ideas I have? What have I learned from previous captains?
"I feel like it's been a very big responsibility in my head for a number of months now and I think it's going well.
"Once you get here on site, you see the players and you start to get more comfortable with the whole thing. But it's very different, I'm out of my comfort zone for sure but that's always good to challenge yourself."
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All captains have their own way of doing things and Rose is quite clear about what he believes is a key to success - communication.
"Clear messaging," he said. "I think that's what the team seemed to like. Just having a bit of a plan and communicating the plan.
"I think that's what I noticed last night is as soon as the players kind of got wind of what was happening today, they kind of started to shuffle into their pairings. You could almost tell it relaxes them, that they now can kind of build. They know what they are about to experience a bit more.
"You come in and there's ten guys and you're looking around and you might not know who you are going to play with. I think the unknown is what scares players more than the job at hand."
Rose will not be alone in picking his pairings this week, wiith both Donald and Ryder Cup Vice Captain and analytics expert Edoardo Molinari on-hand to provide input.
"I think Edoardo on the stats side, he's been very important to Ryder Cups in recent times," he said. "And I think even on my own personal individual game, you can get great insights by using the stats.
"I also think coming into this week, first week after Christmas, stats maybe are less relevant than if we've played ten or 15 tournaments and we all know exactly where our games are.
"There's a few guys changing equipment and this and that. There's a few variables in there. I think sometimes you've got to play a little bit of a hunch, too."
