It seems Indian courses have taken a liking to the Thai golfers. If Chinnarat Phadungsil was the flavour of the opening day at the Avantha Masters, Friday saw his countrymate Chapchai Nirat sharing the top spot with China’s liang Wenchong on the leaderboard, Chinnarat slipping to tied seventh. Chawalit Plaphol added to the Thai domination at Jaypee Greens here by occupying a tied third spot.
Nirat, whose world record of 32-under-par 256 came in India at his winning effort at 2009 SAIl Open, hit three birdies and a bogey on his starting back nine. And, four birdies on the following half saw him take the lead with another six-under round. Wenchong had hit eight birdies and two bogeys to share the lead at 132.
“We’ve got many good players from Thailand as you can tell from the leaderboard,” said Nirat. “This course also favours us as it’s long and we’ve many long hitters.”
Chawalit added a four-under 68 with the help of five birdies and a bogey to his six-under card on Day 1. Chinnarat, however, was a mere shadow of his Day 1 self. From an awe-inspiring 11-under he went down to two-over. If he carded as many as 11 birdies on Thursday, Day 2 was all about five bogeys and a double bogey.
“Chawalit just won his fourth Asian Tour title in Myanmar and we saw what Chinnarat can do yesterday. He didn’t repeat that performance today but I am sure he’ll bounce back,” Nirat sounded the warning bells.
The course wasn’t as kind to a certain Colin Montgomerie though. The legendary Scot, who had famously questioned Augusta Masters’ decision to ignore him and invite three Asian golfers instead in the 2008 edition, including India’s Jeev Milkha Singh, even failed to make the cut, which came at three-under. Montgomerie, who has 31 European Tour wins under his belt, carded another four-over 72 to end his Indian debut prematurely.
Former champions and some other stars were also meted out a similar treatment.
If defending champion Jbe Kruger’s back-to-back par-72 rounds were enough to end his campaign, 2010 winner Andrew Dot returned a total of three-over 147 over these two days to miss the cut. Ryder Cup star Edoardo Molinari of Italy was also giving them company, along with Indian big names like Shiv Kapur and Digvijay Singh.
The home challenge could only heave a sigh of relief when Rahil Gangjee jumped up 23 positions to occupy a tied-seventh spot. The Kolkata pro bettered his Day 1’s three-under 72 with a six-under on Friday to become the best-placed Indian, along with Abhijit Chadha. Gangjee started on back nine and collected three birdies each on both the turns of the course and parred the rest.
“I converted a few more putts today as compared to round one. I sank a dramatic 50-footer for birdie on the third where the ball hit the hole, jumped out and fell in. There were no destructive shots today,” said a satisfied Gangjee.
21-year-old Chandigarh boy Chadha, who was sitting pretty at a shared-second to start with, however, dropped five spots with a three-under second round. Jeev, who started the day at tied 30th and added a four-under score to his three-under from the previous day to jump to tied 20th, with Gaganjeet Bhullar and Anirban lahiri giving him company.
“It was much better than yesterday when I had a bad bogey-bogey finish, which was disappointing. Today I hit better,” said Jeev, who collected a bogey among five birdies, on a day that saw 14 Indians making the cut and Australia’s David Gleeson getting disqualified for signing a wrong card.