Thriston Lawrence remains at the forefront of the South African challenge heading into the weekend of the 150th Open Championship in St Andrews.
The South African posted a second round of 71 to come through 36 holes on four under par overall. Australia’s Cameron Smith leads the field on 13 under par following a magnificent 64 on the Old Course on Friday.
Smith is two clear of American Cameron Young, while Rory McIlroy and Viktor Hovland are three shots off the lead.
Tiger Woods failed to make the cut of level par and bowed out of this milestone Open at nine over. South Africa’s Justin Harding, Louis Oosthuizen, Ernie Els, Zander Lombard, Shaun Norris and amateur Aldrich Potgieter also failed to make the cut.
But Garrick Higgo (-3), Dylan Frittelli (-3), Christiaan Bezuidenhout (level) and Dean Burmester (level) joined Lawrence in going through to the final 36 holes.
Frittelli in particular said he was looking forward to the weekend.
“I’ll go as low as I can. On Saturday I’ll go out in the morning, try to knock down all the pins and make every putt I look at. Try to shoot 6-, 7-under.”
And he’ll have enough time to watch the Test series decider between the Springboks and Wales on Saturday.
“Last week was really disappointing. I didn’t catch the first game. I was in the States and the timing didn’t work out. The second game I watched when I was in Scotland. I’ll definitely have enough time to get back to the room and watch it. But hopefully the Boks can get it done.”
