Golf - European Tour: Peter Lawrie improved three shots to nine under at the Hassan Trophy in Morocco but slipped down the leaderboard as Welshman Rhys Davies took control. At 13 under, Davies leads by two from Thomas Levet, Ignacio Garrido and Louis Oosthuizen.
Lawrie, chasing a first European Tour victory since 2008, didn’t fare too badly on the tougher Red course at Royal Dar Es Salam but was unable to keep pace with the Welsh youngster.
The 24-year-old, a team-mate of Rory McIlroy at the 2007 Walker Cup and third in the Malaysian Open two weeks ago, added an eight-under-par 64 to his opening 68.
First round leader Nick Dougherty, who like Davies switched to the shorter and easier Blue, scored three shots worse and dropped to joint fifth place on 10 under.
While McIlroy was an instant hit in the paid ranks — he secured a Tour card in a mere three starts — Davies failed on his first two trips to the qualifying school.
“This time last year I didn’t really have any status in Europe but I managed to get a win on the Challenge Tour and everything sort of spiralled from there,” he said. “It’s been really good the last 12 months. I am feeling very confident. You play golf to play well and to get to the top of the leaderboard.
“I think if you don’t enjoy it at the top you wouldn’t really want to do it.”
As for his eight-birdie round, Davies added: “It went great. I rolled some really good putts in and overall it was a good day’s work.”
Oosthuizen matched his 64, while Frenchman Levet returned a 65 and Spaniard Garrido a 67.
Dougherty said: “I didn’t play great. The Blue course is quite a bit easier and I didn’t capitalise on it, but three under is not too bad and I’m still in contention. I’ve not put two good rounds together in a long while and I’m proud of my performance.”
Dougherty had a hat-trick of birdies from the 15th and was four under for the round with seven to go, but played them in one over.
It was a disappointing day from an Irish perspective, with Lawrie, Darren Clarke and Gareth Maybin (both four under) the only players to make it through to the weekend.
Paul McGinley (two over) missed the cut in his first tournament since a sixth knee operation last November, while Damien McGrane (one under), Shane Lowry (level par) and Michael Hoey (four over) also failed to make the grade.
Collated second round scores
(Gbr & Irl unless stated, Irish in bold)
At Blue course (Par: 72)
132 Rhys Davies 68 64
134 Louis Oosthuizen (Rsa) 70 64, Thomas Levet (Fra) 69 65
135 Joost Luiten (Ned) 70 65, Nick Dougherty 66 69
137 Robert Coles 72 65, Julien Quesne (Fra) 72 65
138 Robert Rock 71 67, Carlos Rodiles (Spa) 71 67
139 Jhared Hack (USA) 71 68, Christian Nilsson (Swe) 71 68, Shiv Shankar Prasad Chowrasia (Ind) 67 72
140 Steve Webster 72 68, Mikko Ilonen (Fin) 71 69, Stephen Dodd 70 70, Thomas Bjorn (Den) 72 68, Julien Clement (Swi) 69 71, Danny Willett 73 67
141 David Drysdale 71 70, Gareth Maybin 72 69, Wen-chong Liang (Chn) 75 66
142 John Parry 74 68, Peter Whiteford 72 70, Peter Baker 73 69, Tano Goya (Arg) 74 68, Barry Lane 74 68, Paul Broadhurst 74 68
143 Marco Ruiz (Par) 74 69, Simon Khan 72 71
The following players failed to make the cut
144 Richie Ramsay 75 69, Damien McGrane 75 69, Marcel Siem (Ger) 74 70, Peter Hedblom (Swe) 75 69, Kenneth Ferrie 75 69, Mark Foster 77 67
145 Jose-Filipe Lima (Por) 75 70, Alexander Noren (Swe) 77 68, Martin Erlandsson (Swe) 77 68, Marc Warren 75 70, Shane Lowry 74 71, Phillip Price 69 76, Alastair Forsyth 74 71
146 Rafael Cabrera Bello (Spa) 74 72
147 Gary Orr 74 73, Francois Delamontagne (Fra) 75 72, Santiago Luna (Spa) 77 70, Paul McGinley 76 71, Seve Benson 73 74
149 Oskar Henningsson (Swe) 76 73, Michael Hoey 80 69, Jose Manuel Lara (Spa) 76 73
151 Reda Rhazali (Mal) 76 75
At Red Course (Par: 73)
134 Ignacio Garrido (Spa) 67 67
135 Thomas Aiken (Rsa) 67 68
136 Francesco Molinari (Ita) 66 70, Rafael Echenique (Arg) 68 68, Sam Little 67 69, Peter Lawrie 66 70
137 Gregory Havret (Fra) 70 67
138 Azuma Yano (Jpn) 70 68, Stephen Gallacher 66 72, David Horsey 67 71
139 Anthony Kang (USA) 70 69, Niclas Fasth (Swe) 68 71
140 Jeppe Huldahl (Den) 73 67, Andrew Butterfield 71 69, Shiv Kapur (Ind) 67 73, David Howell 70 70, David Lynn 69 71, Alejandro Canizares (Spa) 67 73, Fabrizio Zanotti (Par) 66 74, Jean-Francois Lucquin (Fra) 68 72
141 Ricardo Gonzalez (Arg) 66 75, Faycal Serghini (Mor) 73 68, Gregory Bourdy (Fra) 72 69, Darren Clarke 69 72, Pablo Larrazabal (Spa) 73 68
142 Anthony Wall 69 73, Richard Bland 69 73, Nicolas Colsaerts (Bel) 71 71, Mark Brown (Nzl) 69 73, Pablo Martin (Spa) 69 73, Graeme Storm 73 69, Raphael Jacquelin (Fra) 69 73
143 Gary Lockerbie 74 69, Gary Boyd 71 72, Jamie Donaldson 73 70, Younes El Hassani (Mor) 71 72
The following players failed to make the cut
144 Daniel Vancsik (Arg) 73 71, Andrew Tampion (Aus) 73 71, Paul Waring 76 68, Richard McEvoy 71 73
145 Felipe Aguilar (Chi) 73 72, Richard Finch 71 74
146 Sam Hutsby 74 72, Robert Jan Derksen (Ned) 71 75, Daniel Brooks 74 72, Markus Brier (Aut) 73 73
147 Chris Gane 75 72, David Dixon 73 74, Ariel Canete (Arg) 72 75
148 Mikael Lundberg (Swe) 73 75
150 Christian Cevaer (Fra) 74 76
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