Natadola Bay (Fiji): Gaganjeet Bhullar turned in yet another steady round of three-under 69 to overturn a six-shot deficit into a one-shot lead on a blustery day at the Fiji International golf tournament here, Saturday.
The 30-year-old Bhullar moved to eight-under 208, one stroke adrift of Terry Pilkadaris (71), Andrew Dodt (72), Jarryd Felton (71) and Jake McLeod (70).
Overnight leader Ben Campbell had a major meltdown dropping four shots between the fourth and eighth holes followed by a double bogey on 16th and a bogey on 17th. His five-over 77 saw him slip to fifth, but he is only two behind the new leader Bhullar and one behind the second placed bunch of four.
Bhullar despite being only one shot ahead, will start as the big favourite Sunday as the collective Asian Tour wins of his four closest pursuers are fewer than his eight on the Asian Tour. But in a close contest like this no one within four or five shots can be ruled out, especially if the wind is up on the final day.
“It’s never easy to play in this kind of situations, but I remember the last tournament I won was in Macau and it was really, really windy. So of course I do have a lot of positive memories playing in this kind of situations,” said Bhullar.
Bhullar was six behind at the start Saturday, but he got off to a hot start with birdies on first two holes to close the gap between him and Campbell, whose birdie on third kept the distance to five shots.
Then came Campbell’s nightmarish stretch of four bogeys in five holes. Bhullar, meanwhile, was moving up and he first got a share of the lead with Dodt with a birdie on 12th. Another birdie on 17th gave him sole lead as others failed to catch up.
“I had a great start to the day. I started with two good birdies and then I kept on hitting the ball really well and the ball was in play throughout the round,” Bhullar informed. Despite the windy conditions, I kept the ball in play, and holed a lot of really tricky putts, like the par save on No.9 and No. 10, those were basically the game changers today.”