Woods set for worst-ever round as Smyth ties for lead

Tiger Woods was heading for the biggest nightmare of his professional career today as Muirfield turned nasty and claimed the scalp of golf’s most famous player.

Sat, 20 Jul, 2002 - 19:11

Tiger Woods was heading for the biggest nightmare of his professional career today as Muirfield turned nasty and claimed the scalp of golf’s most famous player.

In the six years since he left the amateur ranks the Masters and US Open champion has never had a score in the eighties anywhere in the world.

But trying to avoid that became the limit of the 26-year-old’s ambitions on a day of wind and rain that, barring a miracle in the final round, had ended his Grand Slam dream.

Woods slumped to an horrendous 42 for the front nine - only three of the other 82 players did worse - and when he had three more bogeys and a double-bogey at the start of the inward half the damage seemed irreparable.

The world number one had tumbled from four under par to seven over - close to last - and while others were suffering as well, it had to hurt Woods more than anybody.

He was a virtual spectator as the battle for the title - a battle for survival now - continued elsewhere.

Nine different players tasted the lead, but as the third round neared its conclusion three of them were leading the way on three under.

They were 49-year-old Irishman Des Smyth - trying to become the oldest-ever winner of a major title in history - Swede Carl Pettersson and Dane Soren Hansen.

Like Woods, Colin Montgomerie was nowhere to be seen on the leaderboard.

Twenty-four hours after setting a new record for the lengthened links with a 64, the Scot was greeted on the first tee by a huge cheer.

But he went to the turn in 41, only one better than Woods, and when he then carried on double-bogey, bogey, bogey, bogey he was six over.

Padraig Harrington was one of the five halfway leaders, but even with a birdie at the first - rare indeed - the Dubliner could do no better than 41 going out either and with a bogey at the 10th stood level par.

Smyth and Pettersson had six holes to play and Hansen seven, but the good news for them was that conditions were finally starting to improve. Too late, however, for Woods, Montgomerie and countless others.

In the group one behind the three pacesetters, amazingly, were Justin Rose and Justin Leonard, who fittingly finished their day’s work just in time.

The two playing partners began in joint 50th place and finished it 90 minutes before the last group - Ernie Els and Shigeki Maruyama - even set off. But they were laughing all the way up the leaderboard as the weather turned foul.

It was only as the last 20-odd players set off that conditions became seriously ugly.

Rose recovered from his disappointing Friday 75 with his second 68 of the week.

The 21-year-old had to wait to see just how that well that stacked up come the end of the day, but his first wish was granted when he saw the skies darken, felt the temperature drop and, most importantly, heard the wind howling.

It ruined some people’s days in one fell swoop. David Toms had an eight on the 443-yard eighth en route to an 81, Steve Stricker the same at the long fifth, Warren Bennett, Lee Janzen and Stephen Ames sevens there and Stewart Cink a triple-bogey on the sixth.

Very soon there were an awful lot of people - crowd as well as players and caddies, of course - awfully wet, cold and miserable.

Of the leaders Smyth and American Bob Tway were the first to suffer with double-bogeys at the first, but Harrington somehow made a 30-foot birdie putt there and went ahead on his own at seven under.

That did not last long as Maruyama, from the right rough, hit a wondrous second to two feet and joined him on seven under.

Up ahead, as the rain turned torrential and with the wind almost horizontal, Woods became a victim as well.

Woods, having already bogeyed the first and fourth, became another to run up a seven on the next. Left rough, right rough - accompanied by the first of many angry thrashes in temper - chop out, over the green was the story of that as the Grand Slam was forgotten.

His grimaces provided great pictures for those photographers who had not retreated to a dry place by then - but when more bogeys came on the sixth and eighth to leave him two over they must have wondered if he was worth following any more.

The same applied to those with Montgomerie after bogeys at the fourth, fifth and sixth and double-bogey at the eighth, all of which sent him down to one over the day after his glorious 64.

When Maruyama double-bogeyed the second, missing from 18 inches, and bogeyed the third Harrington led by two, but the Dubliner then dropped two shots himself on the short fourth. Right off the tee, he flew the green with his chip, then skinned his next effort as well, 40 feet past the flag.

He and Els were level as a result on five under, while Harrington’s playing partner Duffy Waldorf bogeyed the first four holes - and followed that with two double-bogeys.

It was an ever-changing position, largely through players dropping shots but at the ninth through someone at last doing something good.

Nick Price eagled it and became a joint leader too, only to bogey the 10th and 13th.

Els was hanging on at two under and Sergio Garcia’s 71 put him in the thick of the action on the same mark.

British Open Leaderboard - third round

3 under - Des Smyth (47)

Carl Pettersson (Swe) (47)

Soren Hansen (Den) (46)

2 under - Justin Leonard (USA) (54)

Justin Rose (54)

Sergio Garcia (Spa) (54)

Scott McCarron (USA) (54)

Nick Price (Zim) (49)