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Key occasions
Birdie for Justin Rose! He takes somewhat an excessive amount of sand together with his splash out of the bunker at 2, leaving himself a quick downhill 15-footer. However he rolls within the birdie putt. Excellent line, excellent weight, just about an ideal begin. He restores the four-shot lead he held final night earlier than bogey at 18.
-8: Rose (2)
-4: Conners, Scheffler, Åberg
-3: Hatton, DeChambeau
-2: Rai, English, Day, Bhatia
A big stroke of luck for Rose at 2. He pulls his lengthy iron in the direction of the timber, and he squats down to look at the outcome, narrowing his eyes anxiously. The ball pings off a department and again into play, dribbling into the bunker guarding the front-left portion of the inexperienced. He’ll have an opportunity to stand up and down for a sandy birdie. For a nanosecond there, he was worrying about working up a rating.
Justin Rose at 2. He sends a delicate draw that threatens to flirt with the timber on the left however finally behaves itself and rolls alongside that facet of the green. Nothing fallacious there, and the early indicators are that he’s mounted the issue that received him into tree-based hassle down the suitable of 17 and 18 final night time. Pink Dogwood was the second-easiest gap of the primary spherical – one other par 5, the eighth, gave up most to the sphere yesterday – and an early birdie for Rose right here would give everybody else nonetheless sitting on the veranda one thing further to consider.
A strong begin for Justin Rose. His second into 1 bumbles down the financial institution to the suitable of the inexperienced, however he almost holes his chip and tidies up for a gap par. Rose is by far the earliest starter of the main bunch, although we’ll see Ludvig Åberg and Akshay Bhatia throughout the hour, and Bryson DeChambeau not lengthy after.
-7: Rose (1)
-4: Conners, Scheffler, Åberg
-3: Hatton, DeChambeau
-2: Rai, English, Day, Bhatia
The chief Justin Rose is out and about! He’s safely stroked his opening drive down the center of Tea Olive. That’ll give him succour after carving a few worryingly wayward tee photographs method proper at 17 and 18 yesterday night.
… so having mentioned that, of the 18 gamers on the market already, solely 5 of them are below par for his or her spherical to date. Solely a type of have carded multiple birdie. England’s Laurie Canter flew out of the blocks with birdies at 1 and a pair of, however he’s handed again a type of photographs at 4. The 35-year-old debutant from Tub is at present +4 after a 77 yesterday that promised extra, till he carded late double bogeys at 16 and 17. Rory, you aren’t alone.
Right here we go, then, and the morning starters ought to have the very best of the circumstances immediately. There have been rainstorms final night time, and the greens ought to be good and responsive in consequence. Sound the low-scores klaxon! However will we hear the precise climate klaxon later? There’s a 30 % change of a thunderstorm later within the afternoon. What’s sure is the temperature will rise because the day progresses, and so will the windspeeds. So sure, the fellows out early would be the happiest. The weekend is anticipated to be dry and more and more sunny and heat. Sunday ought to be an image.
Preamble
Yesterday was all about 44-year-old Justin Rose’s fantastic 67, the primary chapter of what might develop into the best romantic story ever written by anybody from north-east Hampshire (offering we go away Jane Austen out of this). Hartley Wintney’s most interesting couldn’t proper the nearly-man wrongs of 2007, 2015 and 2017, might he? Maybe. Fingers crossed. Let’s see. Three days nonetheless to go. I’ll have misplaced my coronary heart, however not my self-control.
Yesterday was additionally about Rory McIlroy. Any individual shouted “hallelujah!” when Scottie Scheffler hit his opening drive. Different well-worn biblical exclamations might nicely have been barked by followers of McIlroy, with some feeling, as he melted down on the homeward stretch, carding careless, clumsy, useless double bogeys at 15 and 17. Oh Rory. If we beloved you much less, we would be capable of discuss it extra.
Anyway, right here’s how the highest of the leaderboard takes care of an entertaining and dramatic opening day at Augusta Nationwide. No one on it’s out of competition, so greatest to strategy the duty in hand calmly. Bear in mind: indignant individuals are not all the time smart.
-7: Rose
-4: Conners, Scheffler, Åberg
-3: Hatton, DeChambeau
-2: Rai, English, Day, Bhatia
-1: M Kim, Thompson, Smith, {Couples}, Harman, Reed, Greyserman, MW Lee, Watson, McCarty, McCarthy, Berger, Fitzpatrick, Im, Hovland, Lowry
E: Younger, Z Johnson, Jaeger, Morikawa, Niemann, McNealy, Campbell, Hoge, Garcia, McIlroy, Theegala
Immediately’s tee instances
(USA until acknowledged, all instances BST)
12.40 Rafael Campos (Pur), Cameron Davis (Aus), Austin Eckroat
12.51 Angel Cabrera (Arg), Laurie Canter (Eng), Adam Schenk
13.02 Brian Campbell, Thriston Lawrence (Rsa), Jose Maria Olazabal (Spa)
13.13 Evan Beck, Matthieu Pavon (Fra), Bubba Watson
13.24 Christiaan Bezuidenhout (Rsa), Tom Hoge, Matt McCarty
13.35 Denny McCarthy, Charl Schwartzel (Rsa), Hiroshi Tai (Sgp)
13.52 Max Homa, Justin Rose (Eng), JJ Spaun
14.03 Justin Hastings (Cay), Dustin Johnson, Nick Taylor (Can)
14.14 Daniel Berger, Sergio Garcia (Spa), Lucas Glover
14.25 Patrick Cantlay, Matthew Fitzpatrick (Eng), Rasmus Hoejgaard (Den)
14.36 Russell Henley, Sung-Jae Im (Kor), Brooks Koepka
14.47 Viktor Hovland (Nor), Xander Schauffele, Adam Scott (Aus)
14.58 Ludvig Aaberg (Swe), Akshay Bhatia, Rory McIlroy (NIrl)
15.15 Bryson DeChambeau, Shane Lowry (Irl), Hideki Matsuyama (Jpn)
15.26 Wyndham Clark, Tommy Fleetwood (Eng), Jon Rahm (Spa)
15.37 Sam Burns, Sepp Straka (Aut), Sahith Theegala
15.48 Patton Kizzire, Davis Riley
15.59 Nicolai Hoejgaard (Den), Jhonattan Vegas (Ven), Chun-An Yu (Tai)
16.10 Michael Kim, Mike Weir (Can), Cameron Younger
16.21 Joe Highsmith, Zach Johnson, Chris Kirk
16.38 Nicolas Echavarria (Col), Davis Thompson, Danny Willett (Eng)
16.49 Noah Kent, Bernhard Langer (Ger), Will Zalatoris
17.00 J. T. Poston, Aaron Rai (Eng), Cameron Smith (Aus)
17.11 Fred {Couples}, Harris English, Taylor Pendrith (Can)
17.22 Corey Conners (Can), Brian Harman, Stephan Jaeger (Ger)
17.33 Byeong-Hun An (Kor), Max Greyserman, Patrick Reed
17.50 Nick Dunlap, Billy Horschel, Robert MacIntyre (Sco)
18.01 Min-Woo Lee (Aus), Collin Morikawa, Joaquin Niemann (Chi)
18.12 Keegan Bradley, Jason Day (Aus), Phil Mickelson
18.23 Jose Luis Ballester (Spa), Scottie Scheffler, Justin Thomas
18.34 Tyrrell Hatton (Eng), Joo-Hyung Kim (Kor), Jordan Spieth
18.45 Thomas Detry (Bel), Tony Finau, Maverick McNealy