After heavy rain overnight, the course softened which allowed the field to attack a lot of the pins, generating some fantastic scoring early on Saturday at the Brabazon Trophy at Hankley Common, and both Matthew McClean and Paul Coughlan made early moves to put themselves in sight of the lead.
Unfortunately, neither man could keep it going and they carded matching 69s, leaving McClean tied for 17th on -1 and Coughlan one shot further back sharing 23rd.
Coughlan was the first of the two to get his third round underway and birdies on four, five and seven got him to -3 early in the round. A bogey on nine saw him turn at two-under for the day, and that’s how he’d finish after trading two birdies with two bogeys on the back side.
McClean’s start was even more impressive as he reeled off three birdies in a row from the second, and he turned in 33 – one less than Coughlan – after adding one more birdie after a bogey. From there, it was a Jekyll and Hyde closing, as three bogeys in-a-row from the 10th undid all the early work, but then three more birdies in a four-hole stretch from 13 got him right back into contention before a closing bogey dropped him back to -1 overall.
Italian Biagio Andrea Gagliardi leads on -7 going into the final round while Australian Kayun Mudadana shot the course record (-8) to put himself in contention.
Gagliardi’s round of 69 (-2) sees him take a one-shot lead into the final day, ahead of Mattias Varjun (Estonia) and Eliot Baker (Tiverton), who shot 70 (-1) and 71 (level-par) respectively.
The round of the day however came from Australia’s Mudadana (pictured above) who shot an incredible seven birdies on the front nine, and 10 in total, to help him to 63 (-8), which is the new Hankley Common course record off the championship tees.
Mudadana said: “The last couple of days I’ve felt like I played some good golf, but just had nothing really going my way. But today I started the round pretty good. I had a really good front nine and then sort of held it together on the back.”
The Australian had local Hankley Common member Chris Brown on the bag, with Brown also hosting several of the Australian players at his home. And Mudadana added: “It was good to have someone to talk to. I didn’t have a caddie the last two days, which was a bit boring! But it was good and Chris was really helpful in areas where I asked.”
Brown (pictured below with Mudadana) joked: “I haven’t had the nod yet, but I would be slightly disappointed to be sacked after one round!”
Mudadana is tied-4th alongside Burnham & Berrow’s Freddie Turnell and England Men’s Squad player Ben Bolton (Enville), the latter who shot himself back into contention with a solid round of 68 (-3). The trio are three shots back of the lead while five players are tied-7th.
Scotland’s Jack McDonald, Sweden’s Simon Hovdal, The Oaks’ Jake Sowden, Addington Palace’s Harry Crockett, and 2024 English Amateur champion Harley Smith (The Rayleigh) all sit on -3 overall.
Surrey’s Crockett, who missed out on qualifying last week on countback, was on the reserve list for the event. After a last-minute dropout this week, Crockett took his opportunity with both hands as he made the cut, and a score of 70 (-1) on day three leaves him just four back of the lead.
Earlier in the day, American Mason Howell, who just made the cut on Friday thanks to a hole-in-one, had a tremendous third round as he levelled the course record with -7, which included five birdies and an eagle on the par-5 13th – until Mudadana’s -8!
Long Sutton’s Andrew Isaacs enjoyed seven birdies in his 66 (-5) to rocket up the leaderboard ahead of the final day.
Check out the leaderboard here.
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