Luke Donald took a share of the clubhouse lead on the first day of the Deutsche Bank Open after a round of 67 in Boston.
Donald finished his round on four under, giving him a share of the lead with 30-year-old American Colt Knost, while fellow Brit Ian Poulter was one shot further back.
World No 1 Rory McIlroy suffered a mixed day however, three-putting the final green to go into the clubhouse with back-to-back bogeys and leave him one-under par as he looks to secure his position at the top of the world rankings.
Jason Day, the form man on the tour at the moment, also struggled on the final hole and missed the chance to claim an outright lead before finishing three under.
The day however, belonged to Britain’s Luke Donald. He hit four birdies on the back nine and just two bogeys throughout the day to take a big step towards advancing to the next FedEx Cup play-off event, which is to be held at Conway Farms where he is a member.
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At the end of the round, Donald said: “(It was a) good solid start, scoring was tougher today than in previous days but it was a good solid round and I’ll take it.
“I got very fortunate at 13 when my tee-shot hit one of those rocks and rebounded into the 12th fairway. Those kind of things are really good for momentum but other than that, I hit a lot of good swings and made some puts when I needed to.”
It was another miserable round for Jordan Spieth however, the twice major champion struggled throughout, holing eight bogeys in all as he struggled with his short game.
Spieth had changed his irons at last week’s The Barclays and went on to miss the cut. He promptly switched back to his previous clubs for the Deutsche Bank but to no avail. Such was the frustration of the 21-year-old he refused to speak to the media having closed with a 75 to leave him 10 shots off the lead ahead of the afternoon session.
McIlroy was slightly more content with his round. Back-to-back bogeys took the shine off his day’s work a little but a 1-under-par 70 in only his second tournament start since his ankle injury was a pleasing score for the Ulsterman.
He said: “Disappointed with the way I finished. But I felt tee to green, the way I drove the ball, hit my irons, for the most part it was very good. I had a couple good up and downs, as well, but I just need to tidy up around the greens a little bit. I had two three-putts out there, obviously not very nice to finish with a three-putt.”
McIlroy returned ahead of schedule to play the PGA Championship last month where he finished a low key 17th but the 26-year-old insists he learnt a lot from how he played Whistling Straits over the four days.
“I took quite a lot of positives from the PGA,” McIlroy added. “And I’ve kept going here. I felt like I hit the ball very well. These greens are probably the fastest I’ve putted on in a while.”
