Min Woo Lee is in the box seat to clinch his maiden Australian PGA Championship as Adam Scott’s bid to win for the first time in almost four years fell by the wayside at Royal Queensland on Saturday.
Perth product Lee heads into Sunday’s final round with a three-shot lead after a third-round 66 lifted him to 17-under.
His nearest rival is Japan’s Rijkuta Hoshino, who moved to 14-unnder following a brilliant 64 on Saturday.
Western Australia’s Curtis Luck is in third spot on 13-under following his 66 in the third round.
Scott, who started the day just one shot behind world No.45 Lee, failed to deliver on Saturday, with his even-par 71 leaving him six strokes adrift of the leader and facing an uphill battle to end a winning drought that stretches back to February 2020.
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“It wasn’t really my day,” the 2013 Masters champion said.
“I couldn’t really get it going and unfortunately I missed a putt on 12 and then bogeyed 14 and 16 and had a rough run coming in there, so the momentum really changed.
“I’m a long way back now, so, I’ve got a lot of work to do (on Sunday)
“I’m just going to have to be a little aggressive at the pins really. You can’t really change your strategy off the tee here but you can certainly fire at a few more, seeing where the pins are.
“Someone’s going to run hot early, so hopefully it’s me.”
Lee, who will join Scott on the PGA Tour next year, said he was “pretty happy” with his third round – which included a memorable birdie on the par-four 12th hole after an errant tee shot – despite a “couple of mistakes”.
“I expected myself to play pretty well,” said 25-year-old Lee, who won the recent Macau Open.
“I’ve been hitting the ball so well all year and the results have been there. Everything’s been pretty up to par with how I think I’m going and how I have been going.
“(Sunday’s) just another day and hopefully I can keep going. I can just control what I can do and if someone goes out there and shoots low, hopefully I’ve finished the day happy with the way I played.
“It’s a course where you can shoot low, so you’re going to be aggressive no matter what. There are probably a couple of holes where you don’t need to hit driver where I did the last three days.
“It just all depends. It’s score dependent but I’m here because I played aggressive and I played the way that the game plan has been so hopefully I can just do the same.”
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Luck was confident he “had a shot’’ of topping his good friend Lee on Sunday.
“We completely grew up together and played all the same events growing up, so it’s going to be amazing (being in the final group with Lee),” Luck said.
“I’ve definitely played events where everything’s looked great, so I’m just going to obviously back myself off that experience and … hopefully get it done.”
Australian PGA leaderboard after Round 3 (Australian unless stated):
17-under: Min Woo Lee
14-under: Rikuya Hoshino (JPN)
13-under: Curtis Luck
11-under: Adam Scott
10-under: Connor Syme (SCO), Lucas Herbert
9-under: Joaquin Niemann (CHI), Marc Leishman, Cameron Davis