Play was well under way this morning at Royal Liverpool, as I wrote at 7am est or noon in Hoylake. There was some rain overnight, but the nasty stuff they forecast never arrived, it was calm, benign and warm, it did rain early but the umbrella's were soon put away...leaving ideal scoring conditions..
As a result of the forecast the R&A had the field paired in three's and split them off 1 and 10 tees to save about 4 hours of playing time and sent them out early, completely I might add screwing up the boys from ABC/ESPN who as I tweeted had to scramble after the decision but were producing a refreshingly Tiger and Phil free broadcast. I was told that ESPN was producing a Tiger only broadcast on one of their outlets to compensate..
Rory started the day with a 4 shot lead -12 after a pair if 66's. He made a bogey on his opening hole and basically stayed at around par while Ricky Fowler ran off 4 birdies and at one point overtook Rory for the lead.
For me the turning point came at 14 where Rory holed a 50 footer for birdie after Ricky made bogey, the old 2 shot swing..Rory seemed to be released, on 16 he bombed a 350 yard drive. then smoked a 4 iron to within 20 feet and made the eagle. He flubbed a chip on 17 for bogey but then we say a replay of 16 on 18, where he made eagle again.
Ricky fell back, Dustin fell back...Rory was and is the story.. 66 66 68 -16 and a six shot lead going into Sunday, where he and Ricky are in the final group followed by the young guns... Garcia, Johnson, Dubuisson, Molinari, Manassero, Scott..
David Hearn is enjoying himself in his first Open championship, he shot 71 and is at -
As for Tiger (73 +3) and Phil (71 -1)...didn't see them play a shot, just like all the rest who are not in contention...and that's the way it should be..
Live scoring http://scores.theopen.com/en/Leaderboard.aspx
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