The Hindu : Chiranjeev still in the van

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Nov 08, 2003

Sport

Sport - Golf

Chiranjeev still in the van

By Our Special Correspondent

India's Digvijay Singh in action on the second day of the Hero Honda Masters golf tournament in New Delhi on Friday.

NEW DELHI NOV. 7. A final-hole birdie kept Chiranjeev Milkha Singh ahead of three other home challengers on a less-exciting second day of the $ 300,000 Hero Honda Masters golf championship at the Delhi Golf Club course here on Friday.

If Chiranjeev's par round, following his first-day card of six-under 66, still proved good enough to help him stay in front, it was mainly due to the safety-first approach of those who did not want to miss the `cut' after some good work on the first day.

Seldom has a leader board at the halfway stage of an Asian Tour event looked so `Indian'.

If Chiranjeev had reasons to be pleased, though his overnight two-stroke lead was cut to one, Vijay Kumar, too, was satisfied on retaining the second spot, where Pappan and Digvijay Singh joined him.

What more, 37 out of the 73 players who made the `cut' at four-over 148 are Indians. For the record, it was the lowest `cut' in the premier championship held at this course.

Coming back to Chiranjeev, he played solid today and stroked his putts well. However, he did not have the same percentage of success as yesterday. On at least three holes, his putts lipped the cup and did not drop.

Digvijay could have well ended up in the joint-lead had he not bogeyed the final hole. In the third round, Chiranjeev will be in the company of Pappan in the two-man leader's group. Pappan played flawlessly on the first seven holes and birdied the eighth. After the turn, he bogeyed the 16th but came back strongly to find birdies on the last two holes and finished in style.

Vijay Kumar started from the 10th tee and was eight-under with a hole to go. But he triple-bogeyed the par-four ninth and had to settle for a 71. Earlier, he had birdied the 11th and 12th holes but dropped a shot each on the 15th and 17th.

He was on fire on the home nine after birdies on the first, third, fourth and eighth holes before the final hole undid most of his good work.

The scores (Indians unless stated): Chiranjeev Milkha Singh (66, 72) 138; Pappan (69, 70), Vijay Kumar (68, 71) and Digvijay Singh (71, 68) 139; Anthony Kang (Kor) (70, 70), Arjun Atwal (69, 71) and Jaiveer Virk (69, 71) 140; Rafiq Ali (71, 70), Gerry Norquist (US) (72, 69), Jyoti Randhawa (72, 69) and Marcus Both (Aus) (72, 69) 141; Mukesh Kumar (73, 69), Stephen Lindskog (Swe) (72, 70), Simon Yates (Sco) (73, 69), Pat Giles (Aus) (69, 73), Adam Fraser (Aus) (74, 68), Terry Pilkadaris (Aus) (72, 70) , Vinod Kumar (70, 72), Firoz Ali (72, 70), Unho Park (72, 70), Pablo Del Olmo (Mex) (68, 74) 142; Scott Taylor (US) (74, 69), Thammanoon Srirot (Tha) (72, 71), Rafael Ponce (Ecu) (74, 69), Uttam Singh Mundy (72, 71), Glenn Joyner (Aus) (70, 73) and Lam Chih Bing (Sin) (73, 70) 143; Ashok Kumar (70, 74), Hendrik Buhrmann (RSA) (73, 71), Scott Barr (US) (72, 72), Gary Rusnak (US) (73, 71), David Gleeson (Aus) (71, 73), Rahil Gangjee (75, 69), Gaurav Ghei (72, 72) and Ajay Gupta (71, 73) 144.

Other Indians who made the `cut': Shamim Khan (71, 74), Sanjay Kumar (74, 71), Shiv Prakash (73, 72), Vishal Singh (75, 70), Yusuf Ali (77, 68) and Ali Sher (71, 74) 145; S. S. P. Chaurasia (74, 72), Balbir Singh Verma (74, 72) and Harinder Gupta (A) (77, 69) 146; Gurbaaz Mann (75, 72), Suleman Ali (75, 72), Sandeep Syal (75, 72), Jumman (69, 78) and Gast Ram (74, 73) 147; Roop Singh (76, 72), Monish Bindra (77, 71), Amritinder Singh (73, 75), Vikrant Chopra (A) (69, 79) and Arjun Singh (70, 78) 148.

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