Dredge effect produces clearer vision in the links

John Huggan, The Guardian, 7 October 2006

Very quietly, as has been his way since turning professional a decade ago, Bradley Dredge has compiled a European Tour season of some distinction. A runaway winner at the European Masters in Switzerland last month - and the owner of seven other top-20 finishes - the unassuming Welshman is the halfway leader of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship.

After adding a solid four-under-par 67 at Carnoustie to his spectacular course-record 64 over the much-lengthened Old Course at St Andrews, Dredge has reached 12 under, enough to give him a two-shot edge over Charles Schwartzel of South Africa and Sweden's Johan Edfors.

Other notables in contention include the recent Ryder Cup players Robert Karlsson, Paul Casey and Padraig Harrington, the former PGA champion Scott Drummond and the ominous figures of Ernie Els and Vijay Singh. All are within five shots of the leader.

But Casey's closing double-bogey damaged his chances of clinching the European Order of Merit title. The World Match Play champion even went out of bounds at the last as he signed for a two-over 74 and a seven-under total.

"I was just trying to sneak up the right side but it all went wrong," Casey said. "I hit a poor drive and away it went. Everything that went well yesterday, didn't today. I didn't make many putts, nor did I control the ball particularly well. I wasn't thinking about the Order of Merit. When you shoot two-over, you have other things to think about."

Some of the most impressive golf of the day, though, was played by Dredge. Over the course where, 14 years previously, he had lost the final of the British Amateur Championship to Scotland's Stephen Dundas, the 33-year-old from Tredegar, one half of the winning Welsh side at last year's World Cup of Golf, made five birdies that more than offset his lone bogey, at the long 6th.

It was a score built around brilliant putting - he used the shortest club in his bag only 25 times - and the fact that he chipped in twice, at the 10th [his first] and 2nd holes. "I'm very pleased," he admitted. "The conditions out there were a bit funny. All of a sudden the wind would get up and die down. But I managed to scramble it round when I did hit a poor shot."

Still, despite the presence of his distinctive moniker atop the leaderboard, the question remained: is Dredge really the leader? Quite apart from the interminably slow play - an average round takes close to six hours - the almost complete absence of spectators and the inevitably dodgy weather, one of the many downsides of this pro-am event is the three-venue format.

While it is easy enough to see who is best placed relative to par, determining the identity of the "real" leader is sometimes not so simple. With three courses of varying difficulty in use, until every competitor has completed 54 holes across the three courses the name at the top of the leader board may not necessarily be the leader.

One man any leader will be watching closely is Edfors. A three-time winner - at the TCL Classic, the British Masters and the Scottish Open - the Roger Federer-lookalike has no other top-10s on his 2006 record and has missed six cuts in 23 starts. All of which had much to do with his absence from the victorious European Ryder Cup team at the K Club last month. Consistency just is not his thing.

But despite a relatively weak finish at St Andrews yesterday, where he dropped a shot at the 16th then made a double bogey six at the penultimate hole via the fearsome Road Bunker - "I got greedy and went for the flag" - en route to an ultimately disappointing 70, he is well in contention for a fourth victory in what has already been a remarkable season.

"When my putting is on, I'm tough to beat," he claimed after averaging 29 putts over his two rounds. "If I keep holing my share I have a great chance to win again. I've always believed that I could play among the best in the world."