Lawrie claims share of lead with seven-birdie 67

IRELAND’S Peter Lawrie carded a five-under-par 67 to claim a share of the lead in the BMW Asian Open in Shanghai.

Lawrie fired seven birdies and two bogeys in sweltering conditions at Tomson Golf Club to join six other players at the top of a congested leaderboard.

The Irishmen was joined by tournament favourite Ernie Els, who fired six birdies and one bogey, French duo Jean van de Velde and Raphael Jacquelin, England’s Simon Wakefield, New Zealand’s Eddie Lee and Australian Larry Austin.

Colin Montgomerie needed to birdie two of his last three holes just to post a one-over-par 73, while Nick Faldo had 16 pars, one birdie and one bogey in a 72.

Luke Donald, third on his Masters debut earlier this month, returned a 70 while Ryder Cup team-mate Paul Casey recorded a roller-coaster 73 with four birdies and five bogeys.

Els birdied the first two holes and added another from 30ft at the sixth before his only bogey on the seventh, a poor drive meaning he could only find a greenside bunker with his approach.

The South African was quickly back on track however; a superb approach to the par three eighth - where Peter O’Malley had recorded a hole in one 20 minutes earlier - setting up an easy birdie.

Els then smashed a three wood to the back of the green on the 570-yard par-five ninth to set up another birdie and outward nine of 32.

Birdie attempts on the next three holes narrowly failed before Els pitched to six feet on the par-five 13th to claim his sixth birdie of the day.

Van de Velde has been plagued by a knee injury for more than two years and has undergone two bouts of reconstructive surgery.

He made several attempts to return to the tour on a medical exemption last season but missed the cut in eight of his 14 tournaments and was in too much pain to attempt to earn his card at the qualifying school.

As a result the popular Frenchman has to rely on invites to compete on tour, a situation which would have been avoided if he had taken anything less than a triple-bogey seven on the final hole of the Open championship in 1999.

Victory in the Open, which eventually went to Paul Lawrie in a play-off, would have given van de Velde a 10-year exemption.

“I don’t feel comfortable asking for favours but that’s where I am right now,” said van de Velde after four birdies and an eagle.

“I haven’t only made enemies it seems and I truly appreciate the people helping me. I was going to enter the tour school but I could hardly walk.”