Sharma clings to lead, 3rd round belongs to Das

Panchkula's Shubhankar Sharma hung on to his lead with a steady one-under-70, while the third round of the 15th TATA Open 2016 clearly belonged to Kolkata's Shankar Das who fired an ace en route to his astounding nine-under-62 to not only match the course record at Golmuri for a professional event but also climb 19 places to tied third.
Sharma will go into the final day of the Rs. 75 lakh event being played at the Golmuri Golf Course, with a two-shot lead at 16-under-197.
Bangladesh's Md Zamal Hossain Mollah (69) is placed second at 14-under-199 whereas the third place is shared by Das, Bengaluru's Khalin Joshi, Greater Noida's Samarth Dwivedi and Rashid Khan of Delhi at 13-under-200.

Sharma (64-63-70), the overnight leader by three shots, saw his lead being reduced by one stroke on Saturday after he signed-in a sedate 70. The 20-year-old, currently fourth in the Rolex Ranking, courtesy two wins this year, put together three birdies and two bogeys in round three to be the leader for the third successive day.
Sharma started well and seemed to be opening up a big lead when he birdied the second and fourth. However, his progress was halted by some ordinary hitting, that resulted in bogeys on the eighth and 15th. A 20-feet birdie conversion on the 16th helped him close the day with a two-shot cushion. Md Zamal (67-63-69) made four birdies and two bogeys, all on the front-nine, during his third round of 69, to continue in second spot and remain in contention.

Das (69-69-62) came out firing on all cylinders in round three to emerge as another contender for the title. Shankar, who was lying a distant tied 22nd and 11 off the lead at the halfway stage, was even-par through the first six holes on Saturday having drained two birdies and two bogeys.

The 2014 Rolex Ranking champion then took flight with two birdies and an eagle over the next three holes to make the turn at four-under. Three more birdies followed for Das on 11, 12 and 13 as he sank a total of five birdie putts from 10 to 20 feet.

He finally matched Sri Lankan Anura Rohana's course record of 62, achieved at the 11th TATA Open 2012, with a spectacular hole-in-one on the 17th, which accounted for his second eagle of the day.
Khalin Joshi (64), Samarth Dwivedi (66) and Rashid Khan (66) also kept their hopes alive with solid rounds to join Shankar in tied third.
Defending champion Mukesh Kumar (70) of Mhow ended the day in tied 36th at two-under-211.