In this theoretical work, we consider the photoassociation reaction of the collision pair O + H induced by ultrashort infrared pulses. We analyze a multiphoton transition aimed at populating an intermediate vibrational state directly from the continuum. Two laser pulses of commensurate carrier frequencies are used to coherent control the photoassociation process. In particular, we investigate how the selective association is sensitive to both relative phase and synchronization of the pulses. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.