Indian trio off to a poor start at ASI Scottish Open

The Indian trio of Shubhankar Sharma, Gaganjeet Bhullar and SSP Chawrasia on Thursday failed to capitalise on the perfect scoring conditions as they made a stuttering start on Day One of the ASI Scottish Open here.

Sharma, who seemed to be getting along fine at two-under, finished bogey-bogey to card even par 71 and T-114, while Gaganjeet Bhullar was one-over through 11 holes and SSP Chawrasia was also one-over with only three holes left.

The first day efforts left the Indians with a lot of work to do in the second round as the excellent conditions at the Renaissance Club led to a string of excellent low scores.

No less than four players -- Englishman Andy Sullivan, Scotsman Jamie Donaldson, Finn Kalle Samooja and South African Thomas Aiken finished their first round at seven-under.

Three others, England's Lee Slattery, Italian Nino Bertasio and Frenchman Romain Wattel were also seven under.

Slattery had one hole to go, Bertasio had four and Wattel had two left.

Matt Kuchar, winner of Hero Challenge, was six-under through 14 holes, and looked set to challenge for leadership, while top draw Rory McIlroy was three-under through 12.

Twenty six players were five-under or better.

Sharma, the first of the three Indians to tee off, birdied the Par-5 16th and parred the rest of the back nine but saw a lot of action on the second nine. He bogeyed the second, birdied par-3 fifth and Par-5 seventh, but then dropped a shot each on the eighth, which was probably the toughest hole on the course, and the ninth.

"I hit a flyer on eighth and on ninth, a longish (199-yard) Par-3 I missed the green and did not make the up-and-down," said Sharma.

Donaldson and Samooja were bogey free and Samooja had an ace to celebrate, too, on the Par-3 15th.

Sullivan eagled Par-5 16th, and his only dropped shot came on Par-4 eighth. Tenth tee starter Aiken was eight-under through 16 holes but bogeyed Par-4 eighth and parred the last to finish at 64.

Winner of The Open in 2016, Sweden's Henrik Stenson called the day's golf as 'target golf'.

Stenson, former World No. 2, but is now coming back after dropping to 44th due to an injury break. With two Top-10 in last two starts, including US Open, he is looking good.

The top Asian Tour player was David Lipsky at five-under through 16, while Korea's Wang Jeunghun, Japan's Masahiro Kawamura and Malaysia's Gavin Green, had all shot five-under 67 each to get off to a solid start and were T-27.

Thongchai Jaidee carded 69 to be T-71 and Kiradech Aphibarnrat (71) was 114th alongside Sharma.