SAN FRANCISCO - Japanese phenom Ryo Ishikawa will face a daunting Presidents Cup debut on Thursday when he teams with Geoff Ogilvy in foursomes against America's Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker.

International team captain Greg Norman said he had sounded out Ogilvy about playing with Ishikawa in hopes that Ogilvy's consistency and experience would be of benefit to the 18-year-old Asian, the youngest player in Cup history.

Ogilvy, the 2006 US Open champion, not only agreed, but jumped at the chance to team with the winner of four Japan Tour events since June.

"I asked him, 'Do you have any problem playing with Ryo?' He said, 'I was going to tell you that I wanted to play with him,'" Norman said. "So that was an easy one."

The match is the fifth of six alternate-shot contests on the opening day of the competition, which pits the United States against a team of players from around the globe - only Europe excluded.

On Friday, the teams will contest six fourball matches. Saturday they play five fourball and five foursomes and the competiton concludes Sunday with 12 singles matches.

Phil Mickelson and Anthony Kim will lead the US charge when they open in the first match against Canadian Mike Weir and South African Tim Clark.

The two Californians will be hoping to reprise their success in last year's Ryder Cup, when they were paired in both foursomes and fourballs on the opening day and stormed back from three down in each to earn a halve and a victory.

"Anthony Kim and Phil played together at the Ryder Cup, so that was a pretty easy one," US captain Fred Couples said, adding that the duo had asked to be first out of the blocks in a bid to "set a tone."

In other matches, Americans Hunter Mahan and Sean O'Hair will take on Australian Adam Scott and South African Ernie Els, Americans Lucas Glover and Stewart Cink will face Fiji's Vijay Singh and Aussie Robert Allenby and the US duo of Kenny Perry and Zach Johnson play Argentinian Angel Cabrera and Colombian Camilo Villegas.

In the last match of the day, Americans Jim Furyk and Justin Leonard take on South African Retief Goosen and South Korea's PGA Championship winner Yang Yong-Eun.

- AFP /ls