Pádraig Harrington slipped back with a third round of 73 at the Scottish Championship on Saturday as Matt Wallace carded an excellent bogey-free 66 to take control of the tournament.
The Englishman recently dropped out of the world’s top 50 for the first time in almost two years after just one top 10 finish in 2020 but he has looked back to his best at Fairmont St Andrews.
Wallace has four European Tour wins to his name and it was easy to see why as he carded an eagle and four birdies to propel himself to 18 under and into a three-shot lead over countryman Garrick Porteous.
Ryder Cup captain Harrington started the day three shots off the lead and, despite a bogey at the second, moved himself right into contention with birdies at the third and sixth before holing out for an eagle two at the Par 4 seventh.
However, that’s where the moves up the leaderboard would stop for the Dubliner as he made bogeys at the ninth and 11th before hitting his tee shot out of bounds at the Par 3 17th, winding up with a double bogey five to leave him at eight under and in a tie for 16th heading into the final round.
Bangor’s Jonathan Caldwell, meanwhile, will go into Sunday in a tie for fifth at 12 under after a third round of 68.
Caldwell kept his card clean the whole way round the Fairmont course, picking up birdies at the sixth, ninth, 12th and 14th to add another sub-70 score to his round of 66 from Friday.
At the top of the leaderboard, Ryder Cup hopeful Wallace looks to be hitting some form just at the right time as the race to be part of Harrington’s European team resumes in the new year, and he believes a new mental approach is helping him rediscover his best.
“They’ve been telling me if I did this, it would come good at some point so I really tried hard today,” he told europeantour.com.
“It was nice to really focus on the process rather than try and play good golf. It was literally like ‘let’s work on this and see how it goes’ and it came good.
“I enjoyed it a lot. Especially at the end there to finish the way I did was really nice. It’s probably the best I’ve ever handled myself.”
Wallace birdied the short fourth and when given another opportunity at a gettable par four on the seventh, he holed from 20 feet for an eagle to turn in 33.
He put an approach to four feet on the 14th and then holed a brilliant bunker shot on the 17th before taking advantage of the par five last to burst clear.
Porteous won the Amateur Championship in 2013 but is still looking for a first professional win on a top-flight tour and he matched Wallace with a 66 to sit a shot ahead of Spaniard Adrian Otaegui and two clear of American Sean Crocker.
English pair Chris Paisley and Eddie Pepperell were at 12 under, with the home challenge being led by Calum Hill and Marc Warren, who were 10 shots off the lead.
Collated third round scores & totals in the European Tour Scottish Championship, Fairmont St Andrews, St Andrews (British unless stated, par 72):
198 Matt Wallace 65 67 66
201 Garrick Porteous 66 69 66
202 Adrian Otaegui (Spa) 62 70 70
203 Sean Crocker (USA) 70 66 67
204 Eddie Pepperell 68 70 66, Jonathan Caldwell (NIrl) 70 66 68, Chris Paisley 66 71 67
205 Adrien Saddier (Fra) 67 67 71, Aaron Rai 66 67 72
206 Paul Waring 68 67 71, Martin Simonsen (Den) 69 69 68
207 Ben Stow 70 70 67, Matthew Jordan 71 68 68, Brandon Stone (Rsa) 67 70 70, Matthew Southgate 69 68 70
208 Marcus Armitage 70 68 70, Marc Warren 67 69 72, Calum Hill 70 72 66, Pádraig Harrington (Irl) 66 69 73
209 Bryce Easton (Rsa) 65 72 72, Ashun Wu (Chn) 67 71 71, Jamie Donaldson 70 70 69, Connor Syme 70 70 69, Lee Westwood 67 70 72
210 Richie Ramsay 74 68 68, Sebastian Soderberg (Swe) 72 68 70, Matthew Baldwin 70 72 68, Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano (Spa) 67 73 70, Ewan Ferguson 67 72 71, Oliver Farr 73 67 70, James Morrison 72 69 69
211 Sam Horsfield 74 69 68, Kristoffer Reitan (Nor) 73 64 74, Alexander Levy (Fra) 70 71 70
212 Craig Howie 70 68 74, David Law 73 67 72, Justin Harding (Rsa) 75 64 73, Adrian Meronk (Pol) 68 70 74, Ashley Chesters 72 70 70, Lars Van Meijel (Ned) 72 70 70, Pedro Figueiredo (Por) 70 70 72, Dave Coupland 68 69 75
213 Joel Stalter (Fra) 70 72 71, Philip Eriksson (Swe) 73 67 73, Daniel Gavins 70 68 75, Scott Jamieson 67 75 71, Shubhankar Sharma (Ind) 71 72 70, Wil Besseling (Ned) 71 69 73, David Drysdale 69 71 73, Darius Van Driel (Ned) 72 69 72
214 Zach Murray (Aus) 69 73 72, S.S.P Chawrasia (Ind) 69 69 76, Benjamin Poke (Den) 71 71 72, Justin Walters (Rsa) 71 69 74, Robin Petersson (Swe) 71 71 72, Renato Paratore (Ita) 68 73 73
215 Oliver Wilson 72 68 75, Damien Perrier (Fra) 70 70 75, Hurly Long (Ger) 69 73 73
216 Ben Evans 69 72 75, Lorenzo Scalise (Ita) 71 71 74, Jens Fahrbring (Swe) 72 71 73, Steven Tiley 69 74 73, Tom Gandy (IOM) 70 73 73, Ricardo Santos (Por) 71 71 74, Marcel Schneider (Ger) 73 70 73, Gregory Havret (Fra) 69 70 77
219 Daniel Young 72 71 76
220 Joel Sjoholm (Swe) 72 71 77
