Montgomerie stretches lead
There was no sign of weakness from Colin Montgomerie over the front nine at Gleneagles today.
Far from it, in fact, as he stretched his lead in the Johnnie Walker Championship to three shots.
Despite everything he put into last week’s US Open, the anguish he suffered by double-bogeying the last hole to lose by one and, of course, any lingering jetlag Montgomerie improved from 10 under par to 14 under.
He birdied the long second and then had three more in a row from sixth. There was the chance of another at the par five ninth, but bunkered in two he failed to get up and down and so turned in 32.
Ryder Cup team-mate Paul Casey had been his closest challenger overnight at two behind, but he bogeyed the third after a bad drive before grabbing birdies on two of the next three and another at the ninth, where he did make four from the greenside trap.
That lifted Casey to 10 under, but into second spot by then had come Australian Brett Rumford, 11 under with seven to play, while alongside Casey were Montgomerie’s fellow Scot Alastair Forsyth and Dane Soren Hansen.
Peter Baker, no longer the holder of a European tour card, threatened to get into contention after a remarkable start to his third round.
Baker double-bogeyed the first, but then birdied the next five and after dropping another shot at the seventh had more birdies on the eighth and 12th. But a second bogey followed to leave him at eight under.
Earlier, in another blast from the past, Sandy Lyle made a charge through the field – until his ball got stuck up a tree.
After making his first halfway cut since the same event last year the former Open and Masters champion, now 48 and playing mostly on invitation after losing his European and US Tour cards, covered the first 17 holes of his third round in four under.
Then, however, came his final drive, which flew into a tree right of the fairway and could not be found in time despite nearly 50 people being involved in the search.
Lyle thought it might have rebounded into rough, but after the permitted five minutes was up and he had gone back to the tee to hit another ball the original fell out of the branches.
The hole cost him a double bogey seven and with a 71 he was back deep in the pack on the two under mark of 217.
“Shame. A four would have made a huge difference and that knocked the wind out of my sails,” he said afterwards.
“That 18th’s been a costly hole so far.” He took six in the second round.
