Life, at times, can be one long round of disappointment. In fact, in Darren Clarke's case it has been two long rounds of disappointments as he completed the first 36 holes of the Spanish Open here at El Saler in 67 and, yesterday, 68.

The disappointment, for Clarke, lies not so much in the scores themselves, for he is professional enough to know that any time you are nine under par after two rounds it is an acceptable state of affairs. But he also knows that he could have destroyed this field by eight to 10 shots by now, instead of being joint leader with the Englishman Andrew Raitt, a player who has been to the qualifying school seven times so far.

The worst thing for the Ulsterman is that in both rounds he got off to a fantastic start, and failed to capitalise on it. On Thursday he birdied the first six holes of his round and played the remaining holes in one over. Yesterday there were five birdies in his first seven holes before he played the last 10 holes in one over. "After the seventh," said Clarke afterwards, "I thought it might be a 63 or 64. I was controlling my ball flight really well, I did nearly everything right and I was on a golf course I love."

But the world number nine, in trying to shape a three-iron into the 198-yard 12th, over-cooked it, missed the green and, in dropping a shot, lost his momentum. Another shot went at the short 17th where he missed a two-footer for par.

There will be a Ballesteros playing at the weekend, but it will be Raul, the son of one of Severiano's brothers, Baldomero. The younger man was 12 strokes better than his uncle over the two rounds, finishing on 143, one under, against the horrendous 155 recorded by the man who, in his time, has won five majors.

It seems apparent that he has burned out completely, a fate that was always possible given the intensity with which he has always played the game. He retains a sense of humour, though. On Thursday he was spotted demolishing a patch of iceplant in which he had landed, and was told he would be fined. Yesterday the Spanish press wanted to know his reaction and, knowing Clarke was in the group behind him, suggested there were worse things for the image of European golf, such as smoking cigars on the course.

Clarke, commendably, refused to be drawn but did say: "As far as taking swipes at iceplant goes, I'm only sorry he didn't take six or seven more and remove the lot of it."