Sandhu, Sharma grab first two positions in Golconda Masters

Ajeetesh Sandhu and Shubhankar Sharma brought home impressive cards on the second day to grab the first and second positions at the Golconda Masters golf tournament at the Hyderabad Golf Club (HGC) here today.
Sandhu and Sharma took their two-day aggregate to 12-under-130 and 10-under-132 respectively on a relatively cooler and windier day here.
While Chandigarh lad Sandhu, who had fired a phenomenal opening round of nine-under-62, a course record, kept his two-stroke lead for the second day running as he battled to a three-under-68, Gurgaon's Shubhankar Sharma submitted a second successive five-under-66 to be hot on the leader's heels.

Sandhu had a forgettable start on day two as he dropped three strokes on the first two holes. Having misjudged the wind he found the water on the first for a double-bogey and then had a lapse in concentration on the second green where he let a birdie opportunity slip away and instead landed up with a bogey.
The 27-year-old Sandhu then staged a valiant comeback with a magical run of six straight birdies from the sixth to the 11th. He pocketed strokes on the three par-5s on this stretch and also made tap-ins on a couple of par-3s thanks to some top-class tee shots. The former winner on the PGTI added another birdie to his card on the 14th before missing one of his shortest putts of the day for a bogey on the 18th.

Sharma, the winner last week in Bengaluru, kept himself in contention after punctuating his round with six birdies and a bogey. His longest putt of the day was a 15-footer for birdie on the 14th.

Rolex Ranking leader Feroz Ali Mollah (68-65) of Kolkata posted the day's joint best score of six-under-65 to take a giant leap from overnight tied 11th to third place at nine-under-133.
He achieved the rare feat of making two eagles during his round. Feroz, who won the season-opener two weeks back, holed his approach from 100 yards for an eagle-two on the 18th and then chipped-in for the other eagle on the eighth.

Manu Gandas of Gurgaon also fired the day's joint best of 65 to move into a share of fourth place with Sri Lankan Anura Rohana and Kolkata's Shankar Das at eight-under-134.
Mhow's Mukesh Kumar also came up with the day's best score of 65 to be tied seventh at seven-under-135 along with Chandigarh's Akshay Sharma and Bengalureans Khalin Joshi and R Murthy.
The cut fell at one-over-143. Fifty-two professionals made the cut. Both the Hyderabad-based professionals, Sanjay Kumar Singh and H Sunil Kumar, missed the cut. All six amateurs from Hyderabad also missed the cut.