Westwood in the mood

Lee Westwood remained on course to regain his world number one crown when he cruised into the quarter-finals of the WGC-Accenture Match Play championship in Arizona last night.

The 38-year-old from Worksop eased to a 3&2 win over the promising American Nick Watney and will now face Scotland’s Martin Laird in the last eight.

With Luke Donald exiting in the first round in Tucson this week, world number three Westwood and second-ranked Rory McIlroy both have a chance to go to number one with victory here tomorrow.

But while Westwood cruised to a convincing victory, McIlroy was being given a tough fight by veteran Spaniard Miguel Angel Jimenez, the Irishman up with three to play.

Westwood was in command from the very first hole, where he split the fairway and rifled a wedge to eight feet and clinically rolled in the putt.

The world number three went off the boil in the middle of the front nine and the turning point came when he hit two poor shots to the seventh and escaped with a half in bogey to remain one up.

Westwood stretched his lead to four holes at the ninth and closed out the match at the 16th.

McIlroy was not quite at his best for the third day in a row but still looked to have too much firepower for Jimenez, who was bidding to break Irishman Des Smyth’s record and become the oldest winner in the history of the European Tour.

The 22-year old looked hesitant on the greens early on before hitting some quality iron shots to put the Spaniard under pressure.

On the other side of the draw, Sweden’s Peter Hanson beat Brandt Snedeker 5&3 to set up a quarter-final meeting with Mark Wilson, who had a surprisingly comfortable 4&3 win over US compatriot Dustin Johnson.

Hunter Mahan thrashed Steve Stricker 5&3 and will face Matt Kuchar, who was in sublime form as he cruised to an easy 4&3 win over former world number one Martin Kaymer, last year’s beaten finalist.

WGC-Accenture Match Play completed early scores (US unless stated):

Martin Kaymer (Ger) lost to Matt Kuchar 4&3; Steve Stricker lost to Hunter Mahan 4&3; Lee Westwood (Eng) bt Nick Watney 3&2; Peter Hanson (Swe) bt Brandt Snedeker 5&3.