The Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship has altered its course on this third Saturday round: the madness records have certainly been contained, and the top of the leaderboard has tightened. It’s not that the Yas Links in Abu Dhabi has turned into a tough test overnight, and not even the wind has blown with the intensity of Friday (which wasn’t much, to be fair), but slightly faster greens, just that, have pushed the average well above 69 strokes, more than a stroke compared to Thursday.
Moreover, a truly casual and strange phenomenon has occurred: of the nine players in the last three matches, only Niklas Norgaard (-17, today a round of 69) has managed to score below seventy strokes. That is, almost all the big favourites at the start of the day have played above average on a course where, let’s not kid ourselves, many very good scorecards have still been seen.
Matt Wallace signed a 72, Tyrrell Hatton a 70, Tommy Fleetwood and Thorbjorn Olesen didn’t get past 71, Laurie Canter went up to a 74, Johannes Veerman delivered a 73, and the leader… Well, the leader, Paul Waring (-18), not only hasn’t moved forward, but has gone backwards with a final score of 73 strokes, opening the door to a good bunch of eager contenders. Who could have counted on such a bottleneck in the last matches? Be that as it may, such a paranormal event has opened the door to a more exciting and uncertain Sunday.
Waring, who indeed has never stood out for his killer instinct, didn’t sink anything at all in the first two-thirds of the round, when his tee-to-green game still showed almost the same consistency as in previous rounds. Then, in the final stretch of the round, he even saved some tricky situations that could have taken the lead away from him. Tomorrow, he will set out in any case in search of his second victory on the European circuit, but today he let slip an excellent opportunity to get the job well advanced.
As things stand, Thomas Detry (-14) went out today to play fifteen strokes off the lead, and a round of 62 strokes, which are still possible around here, as you can see, has even put him in the legitimate fight for victory. Even Rory McIlroy (-13), who was once again coming back and once again messed up right at the end (double bogey on the 18th hole, where he went into the water off the tee), could have his chances on Sunday.
And in this scenario, well taken advantage of by players like Shane Lowry (-15, round of 66) or Nicolai Hojgaard (-14, round of 66), in addition to the aforementioned Detry, none of the six Spaniards present have managed to move decisively forward and get more fully into the fight. Alfredo García Heredia (-12), in fact, who has been the best of the Armada with a scorecard of 70 strokes, has lost positions on the leaderboard. Tomorrow he would need a real turnaround to earn a place in the Dubai Final next week, as right now the projection places him in 66th position in the Race to Dubai, and it is estimated that the top 52 will enter. Something similar can be said of Alejandro del Rey (-9), who also came to this event with those tasks, although the Madrid native has it even worse after signing a 71 today.
