Ice-cool Molinari holds off pack to win absorbing Open

At the moment, he’s two shots off the lead, which belongs to Kevin Kisner. The good thing is there’s not many players in between me and the lead.

The way golf has been going the last few years, it would be reasonable to see the name “Johnson” atop the leaderboard and assume it belonged to the No. 1 player in the world.

Pepperell teed off at 11.40 a.m. local time with Phil Mickelson.

For much of the afternoon it looked as though everything was falling into place for Woods to pull off a barely believable victory, his first of any description since 2013, the 15th major of his unbelievable career and a first since the 2008 US Open. The flop didn’t reach the green, and he needed three putts from just off the putting surface and in the end, it was his first double bogey of the week.

Tiger Woods is in the outright lead of the British Open after a stunning turnaround at Carnoustie.

That will make it more hard on the opening stretch of holes for everyone in the later groups, including Spieth who hit a driver onto the first green and made eagle on his way to a 65 that tied him with Kisner and Xander Schauffele. Today I just didn’t make enough putts.

Kisner had an exclusive hold on the lead at 8-under as he started the 499-yard, par-4 closing hole, and walked away with an unfortunate number for his scorecard and, frankly, a fortunate one for The Open scoreboard and a weekend that could belong to the ages – and the aged.

Molinari, 35, is the first Italian golfer to ever win a major championship.

But the 42-year-old has made a remarkable return to action since undergoing spinal fusion surgery last April, and a third round of 66 certainly had his legion of fans believing in what had once seemed impossible.

Fellow Englishman Justin Rose failed to make a run on his front nine and dropped a shot at the fifth to slip to three under at the turn.

Jordan Spieth’s bid to become the first back-to-back champion in a decade was ultimately scuppered by a double-bogey seven at the sixth and a cold putter throughout, and he would finish four off the pace after a 75. Woods made three straight birdies from the 9th-11th holes and now sits just one off the lead. He pitched from there but left it about 30 feet short, and at that point his electric comeback appeared to be all but over…but then he rammed it in to cut his deficit to one momentarily. Schauffele and Spieth will go out in the last pairing at 2.45pm.

You know the guy that yells “mashed potatoes?” during golf shots?

Twelve players were separated by four shots, a group that includes Rory McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood and Zach Johnson.

Jordan Spieth has a share of the lead in the British Open and a big edge in experience. Woods hit six birdies, with only a bogey at the 16th dampening his charge.