LAW FOCUSES ON POSITIVES ON DAY TO FORGET FOR SCOTS CHASING OPEN SPOT

SCOTLAND’S hopes of boosting its Open contingent for the 150th Championship suffered a blow at the Renaissance Club yesterday when the five remaining home players failed to catch fire.

Barring a minor miracle today, the trio of former champion Paul Lawrie, fellow Aberdonian David Law and Oban’s Bob MacIntyre will carry the hopes of the host nation at St Andrews.

But, 23 years on from Colin Montgomerie’s Loch Lomond triumph, the wait goes on for a new hero to emerge.

With three of the eight original starters already gone and the quartet of Law, Russell Knox, Ewen Ferguson and Marc Warren already seemingly too far back by halfway to have a realistic chance of featuring on the leaderboard, Connor Syme emerged as the lone hope. But the 26-year-old, from Fife, who began the day six shots off the pace, never recovered from a rollercoaster start.

His double-bogey, bogey, eagle start was followed by four straight pars before he ran up a second six at the eighth to drop another two shots. And when Syme followed a birdie at the tenth with six pars before collapsing to a four-over-par 74 as a result of a bogey-bogey finish, all hope had gone.

Four-time DP World Tour winner Marc Warren, out in the first pairing of the day 10 shots back, started brightly when he birdied two of the first three holes. The Glaswegian also picked up shots at the 10th and 14th holes, but a total of four bogeys wiped out the gains.

Rookie Ferguson, also from Glasgow, could manage only a 71, while Law signed for 72.

PGA Tour player Knox, originally from Inverness, did slightly better to improve his standing by one shot, courtesy of a 69.

Despite finishing bogey-bogey, Law searched for positives ahead of his majors debut at the Old Course.

He said: ‘It’s the best field we’ve ever had for this tournament, so it has been an exciting week to be part of that.

‘I feel pretty well prepared for next week, although there’s a bit of work to be done, just fine-tuning.

‘I haven’t had much chance to sit back and take stock and get excited for next week. But the family are all coming down on Tuesday as we’ve got a house in St Andrews, so it will be a nice week.’