Molinari holds firm, but Westwood is lurking
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The top players stalled on Friday in the second round of the HSBC Champions at the Sheshan Club in Shanghai, leaving the leading pair unchanged, with Italy's Francesco Molinari heading the field and World no. 1 Lee Westwood in second place.
If anyone had told Molinari at the start of play that he would card a two-under, he would very likely have pulled a bit of a face. Conditions looked good, and it seemed that scores should be at least as good as Day 1, when Molinari shot a 7-under 65.
He shot out of the traps following a relatively early start, and birdies on 2, 4 and 7 took him to 10-under by the 8th tee. At this point it looked like he was going to steamroller the field. But a bogey on 9 – his first of the tournament – and another on 12, took him backwards, although he pulled one back on the par-5 13th to get to his finishing score of 9-under.
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A torrid day for the Tiger. He was up and down like a fairground ride. |
But none of the big names behind him could make any real progress. The man everyone is watching – all the spectators at least – started with a birdie on the opening hole, but followed it with an immediate bogey on 2, and that was about the story of his day. I'm talking about Woods of course – who else?
He was up and down like one of the rides in the theme park beside the course that makes the 18th tee a fun place to be, fighting his way to 6-under, then dropping back to 3-under, before a birdie on 16 gave him an even-par total of 72 and a tournament total of 4-under. Five birdies and five bogeys isn't the kind of card the Tiger wants to see. He lies in equal ninth.
"The pins were tough today," he said. "They had some really good pins. I struggled. Didn't hit it very well and had a couple of three putts here and there. But I also had five lip-outs, so the score could have been a lot worse, but it could have been a lot better too."
The biggest mover was one of Woods playing partners, "The Big Easy" - Ernie Els. He played steady golf throughout, with birdies at three of the four par-5s. Five under at the turn, he made another three birdies on the back nine, with just one bogey, to finish with a 65. That moved him up from level-par at the start of the day to 7-under and a share of third place.
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