Bhullar starts well but slips towards closing, China’s Wu moves into lead

Dubai, Jan 25: Gaganjeet Bhullar began with a flourish but failed to build on it and ended with two-over 74 to slip to T53 after 54 holes in the Omega Dubai Desert Classic. Bhullar is two-over 218 while Shubhankar Sharma missed the halfway cut on Friday.

China’s Wu Ashun showed he is ready to celebrate the Chinese New Year, landed an eagle two on the Par-4 first hole and did not take his foot off the pedal. Despite a late bogey Wu shot 67 and moved into sole lead at 11-under. At one stage he was four clear of the field before Victor Perez birdied four times in a row from 10thto 13thand added two more on 17 and 18 for six-under 31 on back nine in his 67. He moved to 10-under and was within one shot of Wu.

Bhullar began with birdies on first and second and then hung with six pars and one bogey on the front nine. Not only did the birdies dry up on the back nine, he also dropped shots on 12, 14 and 16 for a 74.

If Wu shows the consistency he showed on Saturday, he could celebrating Sunday with a fourth win and his first since 2018. “That’s my ‘Happy Chinese New Year Shot’,” he said of his hole out eagle on the first. “Today my short game was great, just great. I got a feeling just good chips and good with the putter.”

Apart from the hole out, he also chipped in for a birdie on third from off the green after a poor bunker shot.

The in-form and consistent Frenchman Perez, who in his last four starts has two runner-up finishes at Turkish Airlines and last week in Abu Dhabi was also T4 at WGC-HSBC in China. His sole European Tour win came at the dunhill Links Championships last year and he could be contending for a second win.

Defending champion, Bryson DeChambeau kept himself in line for back-to-back Dubai Desert Classic titles, as he shot 2-under 70 despite two back nine bogeys. He was 9-under alongside Tom Lewis (65) and Kurt Kitayama (68). Lewis’ 65 equalled Tommy Fleetwood’s round on Friday and Soren Kjeldsen also shot 65 to reach six-under.

DeChambeau, who revealed he was not feeling well, a day earlier, said, “I’m worse today. I couldn’t hear anything out of my right ear until number 13 (when) it finally popped. That was helpful a little bit. But boy, was it a struggle out there for me on the greens. I’m going to go work on it a little bit. I didn’t feel like I was putting bad; it just seemed like putts were going weird ways. Hopefully I will have that ready to go for tomorrow.”

Overnight leader Eddie Pepperell (72) was 8-under, a shot clear of Fleetwood (69), South African Dean Burmester (72) and Spaniard Nacho Elvira (66) who closed with a birdie-eagle on 17-18.

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Bhullar makes cut comfortably as Sharma misses; Pepperell leads

 

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