Carl:
I think part of the problem in assessing how Love (and Ollie, for that matter) did in making up his Sunday line-up is trying to accurately gauge who the "best" and "weakest" players are in that format.
To me, at first glance, Ollie front-loaded his line-up, and left the back of his line-up pretty vulnerable. But even he had to be uncertain about just how front-loaded it was; only Poulter (3-0) had a winning record for the week heading into singles, and Donald (although 2-1 lifetime in RC singles) had been smacked around pretty good for the first two days, particularly by the Bradley/Mickelson duo. Even Rory going out 3rd wasn't a sure bet; he drew his only previous RC singles match in 2010, and looked somewhat off a good share of the week. That he played well wasn't necessarily surprising; he's the world's No. 1 right now for a reason. But it wasn't a sure bet. To me Ollie's oddest selection was Lawrie at 5th -- he's the kind of veteran, fairways/greens grinder you'd think you'd want to put out last, just to have something for the very end if the entire Cup came down to that match (and remember Lawrie went last in 1999 and cleaned up on Maggert 4-and-3 when Euro needed every point to stop the U.S. route going on).
To me, Love almost surely knew Ollie would front-load the line-up, and wanted to counter it with some (not all) of his best players that week -- surely there was no one better to lead off than Watson to get the crowds revved up, and Watson had played pretty well up until the, going 2-1. And he sent out his two clearly hottest golfers -- Bradley and Mickelson -- 3rd and 4th. But he still had very good players in the back half of his line-up -- Z. Johnson and Dufner, who would've been 3-0 going into singles save for Poulter's crazy-good Sat. afternoon back nine (both of whom won in singles), along with Kuchar (2-0 and playing really well). Also in the back half of the line-up were Furyk, Stricker and Woods, combined 9-4-2 in RC singles matches. For Love, the big gamble was assuming his off-form veterans (Furyk, Stricker and Woods) would revert to their RC history in singles. Instead, they played the way they did most of Fri. and Sat. -- not that well, esp. down the stretch.
And as others in another thread have pointed out, some of this is luck, good and bad. Mickelson would've beaten 8 of Euro's golfers Sun. (and drawn with Donald); he got Rose and his -6 round. Bubba and Simpson really didn't play that poorly Sun.; they were just out-gunned. On the other hand, Z. Johnson didn't play all that well, but got away with a win against a struggling MacDowell.
For Ollie, Sergio and Westwood -- 3-9 career RCup singles records! -- came through with just enough against two guys (Furyk and Kuchar) stumbling down the stretch. Lawrie -- having lost two matches not closely during the week -- showed his '99 form in beating Snedeker. Kaymer, by everyone's account off-form as much as any Euro, got lucky with a draw against the equally off-form Stricker. Tiger couldn't shake the least-distinguished member of the Euro squad.
In the end, Ollie did the right thing in front-loading his line-up, which performed, and then got some good fortune and unexpected performances (Westwood, Molinari) down the stretch. Love's line-up to me was fine; his guys just failed -- time and again --to close out matches down the stretch.