Error-free Paratore has chance to make history
➤ Italian leads by one and is yet to drop a shot in three rounds ➤ Horsfield equals the course record with a stunning 61
It is not just the famous old British Masters trophy beckoning Renato Paratore here in the final round, but a slice of European Tour history.
If the Italian can again keep a blemish off his scorecard, while turning his lead over 54 holes into his second professional title, then he will become the first to win a Tour event without recording a bogey in a quarter of a century.
Jesper Parnevik, the maverick Ryder Cup player from Sweden, was the last to achieve this rare feat at the Scandinavian Masters in Malmo in 1995.
At the Wyndham Championship his time last year, JT Poston became the first in 45 years to win a PGA Tour event while going bogey-free. That particular gap stretched all the way back to Lee Trevino at the Greater Milwaukee Open in 1974.
At that prize-giving, Trevino famously said: “It’s the most fun I’ve had with clothes on.” Come 5.30pm today, Paratore might know exactly what “Supermex” meant.
Neither the record nor the silverware is guaranteed and, no, they are not mutually exclusive. The pressure simply to prevail is more than enough on its own, particularly as the winner’s board of this 74-year-old event includes names such as Bobby Locke, Peter Thompson, Seve Ballesteros, Greg Norman and Sir Nick Faldo. Paratore is wise not to think too far ahead.
“I played really solid these three days, especially the short game which has helped me save some shots when I needed them, so I’m happy with that,” Paratore said after a 66 took him to 16 under. “But it is so hard to win out here that all I can concentrate on is one shot at a time and not whatever it could add up to at the end.”
South Africa’s Justin Harding, on 15 under, and the brilliant Danish teenager Rasmus Hojgaard, one further back, will certainly not roll over after their own 66s, while Dale Whitnell, the 31-year-old who was working as a delivery driver two years ago, is still chasing his dream on 13 under, after finishing birdiebirdie for a 68.
Yet the one participant blessed with more motivation than any other in the hunt for the £187,000 first prize is another Englishman, Sam Horsfield.
He is also 23 and understandably sounds confident of his first Tour win after equalling the Close House course record with a 10-under 61, featuring three eagles, five birdies and, perhaps most remarkably, a bogey on the par-three fourth.
Horsfield has been living in Florida since he was a child and is the only American-based player in this tournament. Last month, he shot a 59 at Streamsong, one of his local courses that remained open during lockdown, and travelled across to his homeland full of self-belief. Yet an uninspired 70-70 start left him on two under in a tie for 46th. Now, after an overnight change in attitude, the Manchester player is on 12 under in a tie for fifth.
“The first two days I was pushing too hard – when you’re playing at home it really doesn’t matter,” Horsfield said. “But I [called] a few friends back in Florida last night and they said, ‘Dude, just go out there and play like you were playing at home – it’s the same’. I did and it worked.”
Meanwhile, Tiger Woods has announced that he will skip next week’s World Golf Championship event in Memphis and head straight to the succeeding week’s USPGA Championship.