Golf: Woods on track to lift player's crown

Tiger Woods returns to Sawgrass for the final nine holes of the Players Championship in Florida today one stroke ahead of Masters champion Vijay Singh and little-known American Jerry Kelly.

For the second successive year a rain delay of nearly three hours removed any hope of the richest event in golf finishing on schedule.

Twenty-two players have still to complete, but the main focus is on four of them Woods, Singh, Kelly and Germany’s 43-year-old Bernhard Langer.

After an outward 33 highlighted by a 30-yard chip-in for eagle at the long second, Woods is on 12-under-par and Singh and Kelly are both 11-under.

Langer, who has not won since the 1997 German Masters, matched Woods’s outward half, but will resume with a tricky putt for par on the 10th.

Judging by the way he started, the hold-up had done nothing to harm Woods’s attempt to go to the Masters in a week’s time on the back of two successive victories.

The 12 overnight leaders had still to tee-off when the storm struck at 1pm, but once they had the chance to play there was little Kelly could do to protect the advantage he had built so impressively on the first three days.

Woods sank a seven-foot birdie putt on the first and then produced more magic on the long second when he sank his long chip down the length of the green.

Kelly, 117th in the world and chasing the first US Tour victory of his career, two-putted for birdie, but was only joint leader as a result and when he three-putted the fourth Woods was out in front on his own for the first time.

He did lose the lead when Singh birdied the fourth, fifth and seventh, but the Fijian was in deep rough at the 583-yard ninth and took a bogey six.

In contrast, Woods played the hole beautifully in the fading light, laying up and then pitching to eight feet. The birdie putt was rammed home.

The round is Woods’s last before the Masters starting on Thursday week, when he will, of course, be trying to become the first player in golf history to hold all four majors at the same time.

He was also among those affected by the hold-up last season. A storm then left 20 players still to finish and on the Monday morning Woods was beaten to the prestigious title by Hal Sutton by a shot.

Two weeks ago all the talk was of the fact that the world number one had not won this season, though a worst finish of 13th hardly constituted a slump. Now he was looking for his second successive victory, having won the Bay Hill Invitational.

He already produced a moment at Sawgrass which will be played time and time again in reviews of his career.

That was the amazing putt from nearly 50 feet at the 17th hole of his thrill-a-minute third-round 66.

The last 20 feet of the putt was down a slope which made it impossible to stop the ball by the hole.

Woods, however, magically judged the line to perfection and as the ball picked up speed it found the cup and dived in for a birdie two.

‘‘I’ve had that putt before and missed it to the right every time,’’ he said. ‘‘If I’d missed it would have been off the green easily.’’

Only 11 players had done their week’s work when play was suspended. Ian Woosnam was among them, a level-par 72 leaving him 11-over-par and joint 70th of the 75 survivors.

Nick Faldo had just chipped from one side of the 18th green into rough the other side when the siren sounded.

On his return at 4pm ‘‘I could have been at home by now,’’ he said he narrowly failed to hole the second chip and the bogey meant he also shot 72, but was five over.

Colin Montgomerie, who still held hopes of the title and its massive £776,978 first prize at halfway, slipped way out of the picture.

Having repaired some of the damage of his Saturday 75 with a front nine 34, the Scot double-bogeyed the 10th for the second day running, bogeyed the 15th and then ran up a seven on the long 16th.

A 74 meant Montgomerie finished three over, while Darren Clarke’s 71 put him level par and Padraig Harrington’s 72 gave him a two over aggregate in what has been a poor week for the British and Irish contingent.

Langer can still make it a memorable one for Europe, though, but to do that he has to get past Woods and Singh and that is asking a lot.

American Joel Edwards did not appear for the final round - because of something that happened at his very first hole on Thursday.

Following a third round 77 Edwards went to tournament director Ben Nelson and informed him that ‘‘after several nights of contemplation and soul-searching’’ he was sure he had hit a moving ball on the green over 48 hours earlier.

In effect the 39-year-old therefore disqualified himself because the score he signed for in his first round, a level par 72, did not include the penalty.