It was another encouraging day for the South African golfers competing at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, writes ANDRE HUISAMEN.
Zander Lombard and Louis Oosthuizen are both on nine under par and in T9 position after respective rounds of 69 and 70, five shots off the pace heading into the final round of the Rolex Series event.
Lombard, who also celebrated his 25th birthday on Saturday, continued with the consistent performance keeping him in the contest since Thursday.
Two birdies on the front nine sent him on his way, while another one on the 10th had him rapidly climb up the leaderboard, which was starting to get quite congested at the top.
Unfortunately a bogey on the par-three 15th hole had him drop a spot, but he managed to finish his third round on a high with a solid birdie on the final hole.
Oosthuizen, on the other hand, will feel he blew a couple of opportunities to go even lower for his round with his putter letting him down on crucial times, especially given how well he played on Friday.
The 37-year-old‘s irons were firing and he did well to create birdie opportunities for himself but, as was the case at times during last week’s SA Open, he missed his lines while putting on a couple of occasions.
Brandon Stone had a pretty good day out on the course. The 2016 SA Open champion shot an excellent 66, moving him 37 spots up from his overnight score to T24 on seven under par for the competition.
Despite making two bogeys during his round, Stone scored a total of eight birdies, which would have given him heaps of confidence after a slow start to the year.
But it was three-time Nedbank Golf Challenge winner Lee Westwood who grabbed the headlines on Saturday after a superb round of 65, which takes him into the final round on 14 under with a one-shot lead.
Denmark’s Bernd Wiesberger also went seven under for the round and is a stroke behind the Englishman on 13 under par, alongside overnight leader Francesco Laporta.
