Sandhu, Chawrasia Tied-3rd as Kapur shoots course record 63

Ajeetesh Sandhu and SSP Chawrasia carded identical four-under 67 each to be Tied-third at the halfway stage of the Thailand Open on Friday.

They were one shot off the leaders -- Thai pro Poom Pattaropong (65) and Thai amateur Natttaphat Harnchokchaiskul (70) who were eight-under 134.

Sandhu and Chawrasia were joined at seven-under by another Thai, Pro Meesawat (67) and Australian Andrew Martin (68).

Though Sandhu and Chawrasia were the best Indians on the leaderboard, the star performance came from Shiv Kapur, who after his disappointing 74 on first day carded his season-best round of eight-under 63 to rocket up to Tied-10th at five-under 137.

His blistering 63 was a new course record on the par-71 set-up.

Other Indians making the cut were S Chikkarangappa (70-70) in Tied-31st place, Viraj Madappa (70-71) in Tied-41st, while Jyoti Randhawa (71-72), Khalin Joshi (69-74) and Aadil Bedi (66-77) made the cut on the line in Tied-63rd place.

The halfway cut was set at one-over par 143 with 78 players, included three amateurs, progressing into the weekend rounds.

Rashid Khan (72-72), Himmat Rai (74-72), Abhijit Chadha (74-72), Aman Raj (75-72) and Jeev Milkha Singh (75-76) missed the cut.

Kapur speaking of his fine round, said, "It's been two different days for me it seems. I don't think I played that poorly yesterday. I just could not score because I couldn't hole a putt. I was struggling a bit and I hit it into the rough a lot yesterday but it didn't look as bad as my score of 74. I went back to reflect upon it."