Alex Maguire backed up his opening one-under 71 with a three-under 68 at Fontanals Golf Club in Girona, Spain to lie in a tie for fifth at the midpoint of the DP World Tour’s Second Qualifying Stage.
Maguire is part of a five-strong challenge in Girona, and mixed in six birdies with three bogeys to put the Laytown and Bettystown amateur in the driving seat to advance to next week’s Final Stage. Mark Power, who made five birdies, a bogey and a double-bogey on day two is next best of the quintet at -1 and tied for 13th. Playing tough, the golf course is taking few prisoners and Power’s two-under 69 was enough to see him climb into position to advance, with Ruaidhri McGee two shots further back and just on the outside with 36 holes to go.
Sadly, it looks as though John Murphy and Castle amateur Robert Moran have left themselves too much to do after rounds of two and four-over respectively see them drop to +5 overall and tied 55th position.
At Isla Canela Golf Club on the southern coast, near the Portuguese border, Niall Kearney and Ronan Mullarney kept their hopes alive with matching three-under 69s on day two to move to -3 and -2 respectively. Scoring has been particularly low at Isla Canela and Kearney climbs to T36th with Mullarney back at T44.
Kearney was level-par for the day through seven, but three birdies, including back-to-back on 16 and 17 may have kickstarted his challenge, while Galway man Mullarney had briefly got to -4 on the day, but two dropped shots in succession halted his charge and he was only able to get one of the shots back before signing his card.
Both are still well within reach of the qualifying spots if they continue to show today’s form, as is Paul McBride on level-par, though the Malahide man will need at least one round in the mid-60s to catapult himself into contention from T59 after three successive back nine bogeys undid much of his early good work.
At Golf Las Pinaillas in Albacete, after high winds forced the suspension and subsequent abandonment of day one, Conor O’Rourke’s one-under saw him finish round one in a tie for sixth place, two strokes clear of both Dermot McElroy and Paul Dunne who occupy 18th position after rounds of one-over. 18 strokes separate first and last at Las Pinaillas and breaking par in rounds two, three and four will likely see all three advance to next week’s final stage.
Each of the three made three birdies in their rounds, but it was O’Rourke whose damage limitation was best on the tough stretches, and it looks as though keeping big numbers off the card will be key to progression from this qualifier.
Finally, Carton House amateur Marc Boucher, who is the lone Irishman at Desert Springs in Almeria, was one of the unfortunate few who completed their opening rounds before play was suspended for high winds, and with play again suspended on day two, he’ll have to wait until Saturday to complete his second round which he started at +2 and tied for 65th.
Despite currently lying well off the pace, the wild weather conditions mean that volatility is to be expected so he is far from being out of the picture.
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