Stenson juggling his time ahead of Ryder Cup

Ryder Cup captain Henrik Stenson is trying to strike a balance between playing and planning as he prepares to make only his second appearance in Europe this season.

The 46-year-old finished joint 34th at the Porsche European Open in Germany last week, having made nine previous appearances in the United States, where he has missed the cut at four tournaments and withdrew from another with injury.

This week, the Swede and compatriot Annika Sorenstam are jointly hosting the Volvo Car Scandinavian Mixed event at Halmstad Golf Club and Stenson is hoping to get a boost from playing on home soil to take his mind off preparations for next year's event in Rome.

"It has been quite busy, a lot of planning, we have the great team from Ryder Cup Europe and my own team around me. They are all working hard to make sure we get everything done," he said.

"There are a lot of processes and we are moving along nicely with quite a few of them, so it is busy, busy.

"I have been working a lot on the long game over the past six months and I feel like it has been trending in the spring: I haven't really had any results to show of that, but it has been moving in the right direction.

"Maybe a little bit of a setback last week, it didn't quite feel as good in Hamburg, but we keep on working away and patience and hard work normally pays off."

The inaugural staging of the event, which sees 78 men and 78 women play over the same course for one £1.5m prize fund - double last year's total - had to be played behind closed doors due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

That was Sorenstam's first appearance in Sweden in 13 years and she went on to win the US Senior Women's Open, which qualified her for a place at last week's US Women's Open.

"I've enjoyed the last