Organisers dream gets Australian PGA Championship underway
Adam Scott acknowledges the large crowd at Royal Queensland this morning – photo PGA of Australia
The tournament promoters at the Australian PGA Championship could not have scripted a better start to the Fortinet Australian PGA Championship any better.
The two star attractions in the event, locals Adam Scott and Cameron Smith, completed their morning rounds in 66 and 68 respectively and as they left the course at 10.40 they held the first and second positions on the leaderboard.
They, along with the second highest world ranked player in the field, Ryan Fox, enjoyed near perfect scoring conditions after teeing off at 6.00am Queensland time in front of a large crowd, attracted by the international success of Cameron Smith in particular who is not only a local Brisbane golfer but a member of Royal Queensland.
But it was Adam Scott who produced many high quality iron shots to take the early lead with an outward nine of 31 to take the lead at 4 under before adding another at the 2nd hole (his 11th) to move to 5 under.
Bogeys at his 13th and 14th holes were followed by another birdie at his 16th and one final birdie at the last for his round of 66 and as he left the course at 10.40 he led by two over Cameron Smith whose closing nine of 32 allowed him to recover from a sluggish start to the round.
Scott acknowledged the perfect conditions and his pleasure at the manner in which he played.
“Yeah it was good, I mean, conditions couldn’t be better and you want to take advantage of those morning rounds. Overall, there was some pretty solid play from me today. A couple of squirrely shots on the back nine but yeah, I’m very pleased with that. It was all really solid stuff.”
Scott also made mention of the return of Steve Williams to his bag and the ease of how they have slotted back into their old routine.
“Yeah, it was great. He obviously hasn’t been out at any events for quite a long time, so I think he was pretty excited. We came out and played Tuesday morning, it’s quite easy. I may have changed, but I know he’s not and so I knew what to expect when we came out and to fall back into familiar routines was pretty good. So, it was a good start and hopefully we’ve got a few more good ones in it.”
Scott also paid credit to the manner in which Smith is handling his increased profile after such a great year, an experience he himself has had after winning the Masters in 2013.
“Cam has had a rise to stardom this year. He’s being pulled in all kinds of directions I’m sure, but it’s something he’s probably learnt pretty quickly to manage at big events.
“I get to observe from fairly nearby to Cam as practice round buddy or whatever, he does a really good job of focusing when he needs to focus and he has a good support team around him to take care of a lot of distractions.
“I really don’t have too many worries about Cam, but hopefully he can enjoy the experience as well, because that month of golf or so when I came home that year is one of the great memories of my career. You bringing it up jogs my memory of it and I just had a great month kind of celebrating with everybody.”
Smith himself suggested it took him a while to get into the groove of things on day one.
“Definitely felt a little bit tired this morning, just the brain was a little bit foggy,” said Smith. “I kind of found it hard I guess to really concentrate out there and commit to shots. I was actually hitting the ball pretty nicely on the range and just didn’t feel that comfy out there. But it came round the back nine and finished off well.”
“I’ve definitely enjoyed it, but it for sure has been long,” added Smith referring to a week where he has had a lot of commitments.
“I had yesterday afternoon off; I couldn’t wait to get home and have a big nap. So, I did that and had a good sleep last night. Another afternoon off, another good rest, teeing off a little bit later tomorrow so hopefully the brain and the body are working tomorrow and we can go out there and try and chase them down.”
One of the latter players in the morning field, Maverick Antcliff, was another to shine. The Beaudesert golfer who has played the DP World Tour in recent years but who has struggled in 2022, played collegiate golf in the US before winning events in China and then joining the European Tour.
This season, however, he has lost status on the DP World Tour and unable to regain his card via the recent Q School in Spain, he is resigned to playing events on the Challenge Tour in 2023 unless of course something very special happened this week in an event jointly sanctioned by the DP World Tour.
Antcliff moved into a share of second place with China’s Yan Wei Liu when the morning field was done, his round of 67 having him just one behind Scott and one ahead of a large number at 3 under.
“To be honest, I don’t particularly love the golf course, it doesn’t really suit my eye, said Antcliff despite his impressive start. It’s in great condition though.
“But I’ve been playing well for a while, to be honest, I just haven’t really been putting that well. So just to see a few go in and stuff like that. Yeah, I’ve been putting in a lot of hard work, so I’m not really surprised, no.”
Liu is currently ranked 900th in the world and earned his place in the field as a result of making it to the final stage of DP World Tour qualifying recently. He missed out on gaining full status but gets a start courtesy of making it to the final anyway.
The afternoon field headed out in still near perfect warm conditions with gentle breezes, chasing the leader Scott who has made an ideal start in pursuit of his third Australian PGA Championship.
