The Open 2011: the final day – live!

• Email scott.murray@guardian.co.uk for HOT GOLF CHAT • Marvel at Paul Lawrie’s hole-by-hole guide to Sandwich • Click here for the official Open 2011 leaderboard • Acquaint yourself with The Joy of Six: Open nightmares • Purchase, for pennies, the tale of the Open’s most useless hero 1.15pm: Sergio’s roll continues! He birdies 7 after sending a beautiful second shot pin high to 20 feet. His eagle effort is wonderful, but stops two blades of grass short on the right-hand lip. He tickles it in for birdie; he’s level par for the tournament! But dreadful luck for his playing partner Rory McIlroy, who addresses his ball to hit his birdie effort, only for it to be moved six inches by the wind. Because he’d grounded his putter, that’s a one-stroke penalty. He misses what becomes a par putt, and walks off the green with a six, sporting a wry grin. 1.05pm: It’s been another distressing day for the young Korean player Jung-Gon Hwang. The 19-year-old prospect was three shots off the lead after the first round, having shot a 68, and was still in the thick of it on +2 after day two. But he suffered in the storms yesterday, shooting an 83, and today experienced further sensations of unhappiness and tumult, carding four double bogeys – three of them on the bounce over the front nine – on his way to a nine-over 79. He’s finished the tournament in last place, needless to say, a whopping +24. Small mercies, though: he hasn’t shot the worst round of the day. At the moment, the American Harrison Frazar holds that unwanted record, having carded an 80. England’s Kenneth Ferrie and Sweden’s Henrik Stenson could equal that or do even worse: they’re respectively +10 and +9 for the day, after 16 and 15 holes. 1pm leaderboard: +1 Garcia (6) Selected other scores: -5 Clarke (2.10pm) -4 Johnson (2.10pm) -2 Fowler (2pm) Bjorn (2pm) -1 Jimenez (1.50pm) Glover (1.50pm) Par Kim (1.40pm) Mickelson (1.40pm) Hansen (1.30pm) Coetzee (1.30pm) Love III (1.20pm) Kaymer (1.20pm) 12.57pm: Garcia keeps the momentum going by knocking in his par putt! Brilliant! He’s -3 through 6, and +1 for the tournament, with the very inviting par-five 7th coming up. 12.55pm: Brilliance from Garcia, who spashes out from that deep bunker, right across the green to six feet. He’s got a chance to save par, though you can’t trust him with that putter. Meanwhile here’s what I’ll be watching on repeat once this is all over. “I don’t know if you’ve mentioned the Golf Boys Making of… video,” writes Gary ‘Monty’ Naylor, “but it’s very Spinal Tap.” “This would maybe work for you. Give you the image of hair.” 12.50pm: A huge par putt on 8 keeps Tom Lewis at +3. He’s been wonderful this week, and not just because of that opening-day 65 either. Meanwhile on 6, it begins: Sergio overhits a fade with his tee shot and plops his ball into a deep greenside bunker. A moment of genius is required here, because he’s got no room for error, having started nine shots off the lead. BAH, basically. 12.45pm: It’s now raining at Sandwich. Nothing tempestuous, just a good honest shower. On 5, Garcia taps in his short birdie putt, and he’s now only +1, six off the lead! Keep it up, Sergio, please. Please. He won’t keep it up, will he? I’m not falling into this trap again. 12.40pm: The wind is really getting up at Royal St George’s, so much so that balls have been gently oscillating on the greens. It’s not stopping Tom Watson, though, who is this close to rolling in a 25-footer for birdie on 3. Meanwhile SERGIO NEWS: on 5, he nearly holes his second, a short wedge that rolls an inch past the cup on the left and rests 18 inches away. He couldn’t, could he? Please. This is going to really annoy me when the wheels come off, as they surely will. “I’m going for Kaymer on penalties – sorry, in a play-off,” writes Gary Naylor, dipping into his Big Tome of Cheap But Amusing National Stereotypes (Guardian Books, 1986) . “And less of Monty being old – he’s younger than me!” And yet still way past his peak, Naylor, not as good as he used to be. But don’t feel too bad about it; at least you’re still making a small contribution to this year’s Open. 12.35pm: The amateur hero of the week, Tom Lewis, has just rolled a 50-foot eagle effort home on 7. He’s now -3, and four strokes ahead of his rival for the silver medal, the US amateur Peter Uihlein. Some more admin before we continue. This is the leaderboard as it stood at the end of the third round, and as it stands now. -5 Clarke (2.10pm) -4 Johnson (2.10pm) -2 Fowler (2pm) Bjorn (2pm) -1 Jimenez (1.50pm) Glover (1.50pm) Par Kim (1.40pm) Mickelson (1.40pm) Hansen (1.30pm) Coetzee (1.30pm) Love III (1.20pm) Kaymer (1.20pm) 12.30pm: A birdie for the Masters champion Charl Schwartzel on the 1st. Meanwhile SERGIO HAS JUST DRAINED AN 80-FOOTER FOR BIRDIE ON 3. A huge left-to-right break, judged perfectly! Good lord. He punches the air with his fist. The putt of the week? Along with Clarke’s eagle effort on 7 on Friday, yes. He’s +2 now, and on the move! Let me reiterate, because I’ll probably never have the chance to write this again: Sergio Garcia has just hit the putt of the week. McIlroy double bogeys the hole to drop back to +5, but let’s not take the wind out of our own sails here. 12.20pm: And we begin with early moves we like: Rory and Sergio have both birdied the 2nd to move to +3. “Am I correct in understanding that the planets aligned to give us Sergio and Rory paired up on the last day of The Open?” begins the extremely correct Ed Ed. “What’s the largest deficit ever made up to win an Open? If it’s fewer than 9 strokes, get ready for a run at a new record. Oh oh oh…..don’t know how I’ll be able to sit still through the front nine.” Paul Lawrie was ten shots behind Jean van de Velde going into the final day of the 1999 Open at Carnoustie. So in theory it’s on. You’d have to say they’re too far back, but let’s not be ruling anything out just yet. Right. Here we go… The weather: Blustery. Anything could happen, basically. I could have saved myself a lot of time and just posted that. Problem is, of course, there are some damn fine young golfers battling him for the prize. Clarke’s leading the field on -5, but the excellent if fragile Dustin Johnson is only one shot behind him at -4. Tucked in behind the leading duo, alongside Bjorn at -2, is the brilliant Rickie Fowler. Martin Kaymer, with one major already to his name, might have got his bad round out of the way yesterday, and is lurking on level par, alongside Anthony Kim, who has yet to deliver on his immense promise but has been quietly efficient all week. And then there’s Brian Wilson Lucas Glover, George Coetzee, Anders Hansen, Adam Scott, Zach Johnson, Chad Campbell… Or perhaps this is finally the moment for Thomas Bjorn, who threw away the 2003 Open here at Sandwich in a bunker at the 16th. Or is it the day of destiny for Cohiba-sucking horizontal Spaniard Miguel Angel Jimenez? Or – let’s not get too Eurocentric about this – perhaps the immensely likeable Phil Mickelson will finally put one of his trademark last-day charges together at a tournament he rarely features heavily in. Davis Love III? Tom Lehman? Tom Watson? A story, please. Give us a story. For the love of the golfing Gods, will one of you old buggers go out there and win it for us? “You know, maybe we’re just not good enough people to have a story this good happen to us.” So said legendary Sports Illustrated writer Dan Jenkins in the immediate aftermath of Tom Watson’s heartbreaking failure to win the 2009 Open at Turnberry as a 59 year old. Well, I hope you’ve all been well-behaved little girls and boys since then. Because Watson’s heroic near miss was the third in a triptych of toks to the teeth, following Colin Montgomerie’s fruitless pursuit of Tiger Woods at St Andrews in 2005 and Greg Norman’s brave attempts at Birkdale in 2008. We’re due one. Darren Clarke, 42 years old and full of steak and fine wines, step forward because this could be your time. The Open 2011 Golf The Open Scott Murray guardian.co.uk

Posted by on July 17, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.