ST ANDREWS: The Old Course at St. Andrews may have laid out a birdie fest with some eagles thrown in, but some of the golfers have put on a spectacle that can only be described as other-worldly. The quality of golf was befitting the occasion of the 150h staging of the Open.
The dogfight was getting intense on Saturday, but the appreciative smiles did not leave either of the top two, Viktor Hovland and Rory McIlroy's faces. McIlroy, seeking his fifth Major but the first since 2014, and playing partner Hovland fed off each other. Starting the moving day at a similar 10-under, both were 5-under through 11 holes that was an exhibition of the highest class. Chatting and pushing each other with smiles along the way, they showed what golf is meant to be - fun with a lot of skill and class.
Birdie putts from 40-50 feet, holing pitch shots and wedge shots from way off in the rough and fescue, and even bunkers, thrilled the packed grandstands and the teeming fans lining each fairway.
Hovland opened par-par before shifting gears. He then had four birdies to race to 14-under and a 2-shot lead. Hovland set the stage with a couple of back-to-back 40-footers for birdies on the third and fourth during a four birdie stretch from third to sixth. He also had a 19-footer for birdie.
McIlroy did not blink. He opened slowly but then stemmed the flow of pars with birdies on fifth and sixth and another on ninth. Then he had the crowd exploding into excitement with a stunning shot from the middle of the sand trop 80 feet away for an eagle.
From 13-under he went past Hovland, who was then 14-under and waiting to putt for an eagle from just over 65 feet. Hovland ran it to 14 feet and holed it to catch up with McIlroy at 15-under.
Overnight leader Cameron Smith, who putted like a machine in the second round, dropped a shot on the first hole, missing a four-footer. Then he had seven pars in a row, as birdie putts stopped frustratingly short or annoyingly slid past the hole. He finally got his first birdie on the ninth and came back to his overnight score of 13-under.
Cameron Young, playing in the lead group with Smith, had four pars to start before his first birdie on the fifth, the gains of which he gave back on the seventh to stay where he was last night before birdies on ninth and 10th took him to 13-under alongside Smith.
Dustin Johnson, former World No. 1 and two-time Major winner, who has now signed up with the rival Liv Golf Series, seemed to make early moves with clinical birdies on second and third only to give away one shot on fourth before a series of four pars. With both Par-4s on the ninth and tenth reachable with eagle chances, Johnson birdied both after an eagle attempt from 23 feet on ninth to get back into the frame at 12-under, just as the otherwise steady World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler playing with him dropped a shot with a rare error on Par-4 12th. Amidst all this, Si Woo Kim, flying the Asian flag, moved from overnight 6-under to 11-under 15. Kim had moved to op-5 with three holes still left for him to play.
However, Kim's playing partner, Sahith Theegala, who has won so many hearts with his fearless brand of golf, just could not get going. He bogeyed the fourth and he eighth before finding his first birdie of the day, but he gave that gain, too, on the next. Most parts of his game seemed out of sync on this day, as he slipped from T-8 to T-25.
