The Open 2024: leaders battle in foul conditions during third round – live | The Open

Par for Scottie Scheffler at the last, and the world number one signs for a level-par 71. Given he’s hardly got out of first gear all week, it’s some achievement to nevertheless be bang-slap in the middle of this tournament. That’s the world number one for you! He’s -2. Meanwhile back on 17, Justin Rose’s par putt slips by the high side, and he screams COME ON in high irritation. I think he’s annoyed with himself rather than some yappy punter, but can’t be 100 percent sure. He slips back to -3.

Justin Rose finds the bunker front left of the par-three 17th. He’s faced with a long bunker shot, up against the face, and smacks a decent if not brilliant effort to 15 feet. Before he can putt, Billy Horschel, who came up short, flicks a delicate wedge from 25 yards to six inches. So close again! But for a couple of inches, he’d have just carded back-to-back birdies. As it is, he’s made two pars and remains at -5.

Despite that wild drive on 16, Shane Lowry is able to advance his ball well up the hole. He sends his third from 150 yards onto the front edge of the green. Daniel Brown’s third, from similar range, screeches to a halt five yards from the pin. In goes the birdie putt, and this is one of the great Open debut performances. It would be so easy to fold under these conditions, under this pressure in uncharted territory. But what a round he’s having! The 29-year-old from North Yorkshire leads the Open on his own. Par for Lowry.

-6: Brown (16)
-5: Horschel (16)
-4: Rose (16)

One of the previous shot-of-the-day contenders was Billy Horschel’s bunker splash at 14. Horschel betters his own splendid work now: plugged up against a high face in a greenside bunker at 16, it’s all he can do to bash and hope, surely? But if you can elegantly whack something, that’s exactly what he does here, sending his ball up high over the face and landing it softly, the ball rolling out and stopping half an inch short of the cup. That deserved to go in. Horschel momentarily looks pained, but suddenly realises how good that shot was anyway, because it would have been all too easy to slam his ball into the face and run up a number. Instead he’s walking off with par and a huge smile. Justin Rose isn’t quite so happy as his straight-ish birdie putt misses by a whisker on the right, but once more the pair exit with their pars intact. They remain -5 and -4 respectively.

Another contender for shot of the day, this time by Scottie Scheffler! He sends a gentle fade into the long par-three 17th, his ball landing 20 feet short before rolling majestically towards the cup, curling just behind it. Not quite up there with Kim Si-woo’s ace, but close! He taps in for birdie to move back to -2. Meanwhile back on 16, Shane Lowry’s head has gone, and he slices wildly into deep filth down the right.

Shane Lowry can’t make his long par saver. His rake is always dying off to the left, and he taps in for bogey. Having reached the heights of -8, that double at the Postage Stamp has really taken its toll. Subsequent bogeys at 11, 12, 14 and now 15 have sent the 2019 champion clattering down the standings to -2. He’s far from out of it, but he’s forced to blow his cheeks out hard to keep his calm. His mood might not be improved by Brown tidying up yet again to save his par. This has been beyond impressive by the debutant.

-5: Horschel (15), Brown (15)
-4: Rose (15)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (F), Schauffele (F)
-2: Lowry (15)
-1: Scheffler (16)

To be fair, there’s no shame in coming up short of the 502-yard par-four 15th. Not in the face of this wind. Shane Lowry and Dan Brown take turns to send two big booms down the hole, but neither get there. Lowry ends up in a deep bunker, and can only bash out to 40 feet. Brown gives himself a chance of escaping with par with a wedge to eight feet.

Schauffele shoots 69

Billy Horschel comes up short at the par-four 15th. No matter! He sends the crispest of wedges from 36 yards to two-and-a-half feet. Par. Meanwhile Justin Rose’s up-and-down is arguably even better, a pitch in from the top of a bank to the left of the green, 45 yards out. He leaves himself an eight-foot putt with plenty of right-to-left curl. He judges it perfectly, and once again this pair leave the scene having made staunch par saves. They’re -5 and -4 respectively.

Shane Lowry’s putter has gone stone cold. He can’t tidy up the seven-foot par putt he’s left with, and that’s his fourth bogey in seven holes. Dan Brown taps in for perhaps the second most outrageous three of the day. The first? Brown’s birdie on 7, having hoicked his drive over Scottie Scheffler’s startled head while the world number one was playing the 8th.

Dan Brown hooks hysterically miles left of 14. Trouble there. Shane Lowry is comparatively happy having sent his tee shot over the back. But then it turns out Brown has benefitted from a huge stroke of luck: instead of his ball disappearing into thick gorse, it sits nicely on a trodden-down spectator walkway, from where he chips deliciously to kick-in distance. Lowry, perhaps spooked a little by his playing partner’s tenacity, leaves his putt from the fringe six feet short. Meanwhile up on 18, Matthew Jordan gets tight on a short par putt, and the closing bogey means he’s signing for a 71. Level par today, level par for the championship.

Daniel Brown can’t make his mid-range par putt on 13 and slips back into a share of the lead. Meanwhile up on 15, Dean Burmester yips yet another short putt for bogey, and it’s catching, because Scottie Scheffler horseshoes out from four feet, and it’s beginning to go south for the world number one, with two shots gone in the last three holes.

-5: Horschel (14), Brown (13)
-4: Schauffele (16), Rose (14), Lowry (13)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (F)
-1: Jordan (17), Scheffler (15)
E: A Scott (F), Thomas (F), Burmester (15)

One of the shots of the week – perhaps the shot of the week – by Billy Horschel at the par-three 14th. His tee shot trickles into the bunker to the left of the green. He’s left in an awful position, the ball tucked up against the left side of the trap. He’s short-sided, with barely enough room to stand next to his ball, but squeezes himself in, opens the face up wide, and splats out delicately to a couple of feet. He remains at -5. That was delightful.

It’s been a miserable day for the five-time major champion Brooks Koepka. Having never recovered from a double-bogey seven at 4, he ends up with a birdie-free 78. Par for Dustin Johnson, who ends the day at +2, not quite out of things, alongside other big names in Jon Rahm and Collin Morikawa.

A wonderful scramble by Matthew Jordan at the par-three 17th. His tee shot is a proper wide, so far off target it misses the bunkers to right. He lobs to 12 feet, then rattles his par saver. Hoylake’s local hero last year is making himself very popular here at Troon too. He remains at -1.

Two big up-and-downs from the side of 13 by Billy Horschel and Justin Rose. Both men celebrate as though they’d made birdies. You can’t blame them; Troon’s back nine is a beast at the best of times, but especially in these conditions. Meanwhile back down the hole, it turns out Shane Lowry’s drive found the fairway, despite flirting with a bank to the right of the hole. He smashes his second into the front of the green. Dan Brown has to hack back out onto the fairway, though, so is hitting three into the green. He arrows his shot straight at the flag, but it’s 15 feet short. Work to do if he’s to hold onto sole ownership of the lead.

Matthew Jordan, having dropped shots at 13 and 15, fights his way back into red figures by rolling in a 20-footer across 16. He’s -1. Meanwhile Dean Burmester misses his third egregiously short putt of the day, this time at 14, to drop back to -1. The small margins between success and failure at a major championship.

Dustin Johnson’s appearance on the fringe of events didn’t last long. He carves his tee shot at the par-three 17th wide right, and can only duff his second from rough into a greenside bunker. He ends up with double bogey, and he’s back to +2. Meanwhile Daniel Brown’s back-and-forth round continues apace, as he follows that birdie by flaying his drive at 13 into deep oomska down the right. Shane Lowry, on a rolling boil, follows him there.

Shane Lowry opts to take putter from the bottom of the swale. He’s not got much green to work with up top. He races his putt six feet past. That’ll be a tester, especially as he’s dropped two strokes in the last four holes. Before he can do that, Daniel Brown strokes in his birdie putt. A reminder that this is his first appearance at a major! Only Ben Curtis (2003) has won the Open on major debut. Now Brown is one clear of Billy Horschel … and two clear of Lowry, who shoves his short par putt to the right. A dark cloud above Lowry’s head as he stomps off.

-6: Brown (12)
-5: Horschel (12)
-4: Schauffele (15), Rose (12), Lowry (12)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (F)
-2: Scheffler (13), Burmester (13)

Dan Brown and Shane Lowry send their tee shots at 12 down the middle. Brown wastes no time, as is his wont, in wedging pin high to six feet. Lowry tries to follow him in, but catches the slope to the left of the green and his ball disappears off down it. Another big scramble attempt coming up. Meanwhile Scottie Scheffler comes up short with his second at 13, and can’t get up and down from off the green. His first bogey of the day, and he’s back where he started it at -2.

Billy Horschel is this close to draining an uphill 25-footer for birdie at 12. A gentle right-to-left curler, it only stopped drifting in on the very last turn. Par for Justin Rose too, a result he’d have happily taken when watching his iron in flirting dangerously with the bunker guarding the front right of the green. They’re -5 and -4 respectively. It’s going to be a super Sunday.

By contrast to his playing partner, Dan Brown has kept his cool. The decision to lay up from 263 yards to a favourable chipping distance is vindicated: he wedges to ten feet, then walks in a confident par saver. That’s sublime course management amid the heat of battle. Shane Lowry then limits the damage to bogey, cooling down before steering in a left-to-right downhill slider and punching the air in celebration. He’s no longer sole leader, but at least he still has a share of it.

-5: Horschel (11), Brown (11), Lowry (11)
-4: Schauffele (14), Rose (11)

Shane Lowry doesn’t take advantage of his lucky break. He gets right under his chip, which only just makes it to the green. Before he walks up to assess the long par putt he’s left himself, he points at some nearby punters and berates them for “standing in the middle of the [word redacted by Family Website Editor] fairway when we’re trying to hit”. The red mist down, he races his 40-foot par putt seven feet past the hole, leaving himself plenty of work to do.

Dan Brown opts to lay up with an iron. This is a par four. But it’s 504 yards long and the wind is howling. Meanwhile a stroke of luck for Shane Lowry, who practically tops his second, pulling it wide left. The ball’s heading for a gorse bush, but hits some dude who is looking the wrong way on his ankle, and stops in the rough instead. Both players with plenty of work to do for their pars.

Shane Lowry and Dan Brown, having hit dismal tee shots at 10, make up for it by firing their blind drives at 11 over the bank and straight down the fairway. A long way back, but that’s not the point. Further up the hole, Billy Horschel wedges in from 80 yards, but not particularly closely. He’s left with a 20-foot uphill putt to save his par … and he can’t do it. Bogey. His playing partner Justin Rose, taking Texas Wedge from the fringe at the front, rolls his ball pin high, five feet to the left, then rolls in the putt. He celebrates strongly. He seems to be enjoying this battle. He remains two off Lowry’s lead at -4.

Shane Lowry nearly shortens his odds, but his birdie attempt on 10 slips by. Dan Brown, always out of position after his wild drive, drops his second shot in three holes. And Billy Horschel takes his medicine on 11, chipping back out into the fairway, hoping he can get up and down from distance to salvage his par. With the rain continuing to fall, and the temperature dropping to boot, the leading pack seem more likely to move back towards the clubhouse leaders than advance. Consolidation is their most realistic goal right now.

-6: Horschel (10), Lowry (10)
-5: Brown (10)
-4: Schauffele (12), Rose (10)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (F), Scheffler (11)
-2: Burmester (11)
-1: Jordan (14)

Dustin Johnson ends a run of 13 straight pars by raking in a 50-foot birdie putt from the fringe at 14. He’s level par. Bogey for Matthew Jordan at 13; the miss from six feet sends him back to -1. Scottie Scheffler races an excitable 55-foot putt seven feet past on 11, but makes the one coming back; he’s hanging on in there at -3, still to locate his A-game, but still right in the mix. Despite it all, he’s still second favourite with the bookies right now, behind Shane Lowry.

Billy Horschel carves his tee shot at the long, long, long par-four 11th – 504 yards! – towards a gorse bush down the right. He may have gotten away with that, the ball stopping just short. But it’s not going to be a great lie. Justin Rose batters his drive down the middle. Back on 10, Dan Brown can only squirt his second from rough on the right to more rough on the left. But Shane Lowry gets a flyer out of the thick stuff and his ball finds the dancefloor. He’ll have a bonus 15-foot look at birdie.

The leaders drive wild at 10. Dan Brown into the thick rough down the right. Shane Lowry out to the left. Looks of concern. It could be a long journey back, because they’ll be dealing with cross-winds for the next three holes, after which the wind will be in their faces, making for some long holes on the homeward stretch.

Shane Lowry wasn’t in the best of moods after that double bogey at the Postage Stamp. Now he growls in frustration as he plays the 9th pretty much perfectly – tee shot down the middle, second wedged pin high – only for a mixture of backspin and the ridge running across the green to bring his ball back to 18 feet. His birdie effort then stops stubbornly on the lip. Just a par. Dan Brown will be happier with his, having sent his tee shot into thick rough. The pair remain at -6.

Matthew Jordan looks in the mood to improve on last year’s top-ten performance at his home course of Hoylake. He wedges from 160 yards to three feet, and tidies up for his third birdie of the day. That’s a fine response to dropping a stroke at 11. Meanwhile Dean Burmester misses his second short putt of the day, this time at 10, and it’s bogey. Both players are now -2.

66 for Russell Henley

Apologies to Xander Schauffele for that last entry. The Golfing Gods must have read it, because the Californian’s tee shot at the monster par-four 11th finds deep bother down the right. Forced to gouge out, he’s always out of position, and the inevitable outcome is a bogey that knocks him back to -4. These next few holes are going to be a battle of attrition for these late starters.

Billy Horschel joins the co-leaders at -6! Another fine approach, this time from 180 yards to ten feet at 9, is converted for his fourth birdie of the day. He turns in 32. Horschel and Xander Schauffele are currently the only players out there not letting the driving rain get them down.

Dan Brown’s par putt from the back of 8 is always missing the cup to the left. It sails three feet past. He makes his bogey. Shane Lowry tickles his downhill effort wide left, and that’ll be a double bogey. The Coffin claims two more victims. All of a sudden, the top of the leaderboard has concertinaed, and with the conditions still miserable, this Open is ON. In the clubhouse, Thriston Lawrence and Sam Burns will have the metaphorical cigar on, hoping and waiting for the leaders to come back towards them.

-6: Brown (8), Lowry (8)
-5: Schauffele (10), Horschel (8)
-4: Rose (9)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (17), Scheffler (9), Burmester (9)
-1: Jordan (11)

Dan Brown does extremely well to flip out of the Coffin sideways, holding the green. He’s left with a 17-foot par putt, but that’s a stunning result from where he was. Soft hands, but a good confident slap of the sand to earn a bit of spin. Shane Lowry’s up next, and first he needs to recreate his lie, Brown having messed it up a bit by taking his shot first. Lowry doesn’t have as much room behind him, and with his swing restricted, can only squirt his ball over the back of the green and down the swale. He chips up from thick rough to eight feet, but this is a big bogey putt coming up for the current leader.

A lip-out for Scottie Scheffler from six feet on 9. He covers his mouth in shock and surprise. It’s not quite happening this week for the world number one, and yet he’s still right in the mix at -3. Should things properly click – and it surely won’t take much adjustment – the leaders will have to watch out. And Scheffler could be a shot closer soon enough, because Shane Lowry and Dan Brown will both have to splash out of the Coffin sideways. Drama coming right up!

Dan Brown, high on life after that astonishing gadabout birdie on 7, slam-dunks his tee shot at the Postage Stamp into the Coffin bunker on the left. Shane Lowry then follows him in! The nerves kicking in already, and the final group aren’t even halfway through Moving Day. Tomorrow already promising so much. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Xander Schauffele walks in a 25-footer at 10, and that’s the PGA champion’s fourth birdie of the day. Back on 7, Shane Lowry pulls his short birdie putt. No mistake though for Dan Brown, and who writes this guy’s scripts? Not his namesake, clearly, because this is entertaining. Meanwhile both Billy Horschel and Justin Rose land their tee shots at the Postage Stamp close, but vicious backspin does for the pair of them, and neither can convert their mid-range birdie putts. A bit of movement at the top, then.

-8: Lowry (7)
-7: Brown (7)
-5: Schauffele (10), Horschel (8)
-4: Rose (8)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (17), Scheffler (8)

This is outrageous. Dan Brown’s tee shot was so wide right of 7 it cleared the Postage Stamp. But from the back of that green, up on a hillock, he lifts a wedge from 101 yards to four feet! That is truly something else, and it makes Shane Lowry’s clip from similar distance – but, the crucial difference here, from the centre of the fairway of the hole he’s actually playing – look positively ordinary. Weird sport, golf. Two big birdie opportunities coming up!

Dan Brown carves his tee shot so far wide right at 7 that it whistles through the green at the Postage Stamp. Scottie Scheffler and Dean Burmester, lining up their putts, can count themselves fortunate not to have been taken out by that one. Unruffled, Bermester makes his birdie putt to return to -2. Meanwhile up on the 7th green, Billy Horschel follows up birdie at 6 by rattling in a 30-footer for back-to-back birds.

-8: Lowry (6)
-6: Brown (6)
-5: Horschel (7)
-4: Schauffele (9), Rose (7)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (F), Henley (16), Scheffler (8)

Sam Burns cards 65

Dan Brown doesn’t hang about. He plays so quickly he makes Brooks Koepka look like Patrick Cantlay. The camera just about catches him clipping a wedge from 90 yards to three-and-a-half feet. That should be a birdie that takes him to -6. And in it goes. This is seriously impressive stuff from Brown, who was about as out-of-form as it’s possible to be coming into this week. “Thriston Lawrence should be permanently in free-jazz mode (4.28pm) as his name sounds like it should have the word Quartet after it,” argues Matt Emerson. “I’ve not seen a picture of him, but I hope he wears a black roll neck and has avant-garde facial hair. Plays tenor sax as well as golf I reckon.” Funnily enough, I was thinking he sounds like a founding member of some long-in-the-tooth experimental art-rock band that everyone references but nobody really likes.

Patrick Cantlay’s tee shot at the Postage Stamp isn’t too far off line … but just wide right enough that the camber of the green takes it off the side. The slope then gathers his ball into the deep sand. There’s no getting up and down from there, and the bogey takes him back to level par. And his compatriot Russell Henley also heads in the wrong direction, dropping his first shot of the day at 15, the punishment for leaving his chip into the green from 45 yards 20 feet short. He’s -3.

More ‘this-close’ action, this time on 5. Shane Lowry and Dan Brown take turns to leave lengthy birdie putts on the lip of the cup. So near to a pair of birdies that would have sent shivers down the leaderboard. Meanwhile a birdie for Sam Burns at 17, the prize for wedging from 110 yards to a couple of feet. When that ball was sailing in, a hole-out for eagle looked on. But a four will do.

-8: Lowry (5)
-5: Brown (5)
-4: Henley (14), Schauffele (8), Rose (5)
-3: Lawrence (F), Burns (17), Scheffler (6), Horschel (5)

Dean Burmester missed a short par putt on the par-five 4th. He makes up for it by walking in a 20-footer for birdie on the par-five 6th. He’s back to -3. Just the par for Scottie Scheffler, who isn’t too happy about it. Another birdie for Matthew Jordan, this time at 7; he rises to -2. And on the Postage Stamp, Xander Schauffele is this close to making the second hole-in-one of the day. He eases his wedge over the flag. It lands a couple of feet past, and had it spun back in a straight line, it’d have been in. But it moves a little to the left, and so it’ll be a tap-in for birdie instead. He’ll move to -4.