Misery goes on for Monty

Time is rapidly running out for Colin Montgomerie to maintain his proud records of finishing in the top 10 on the Order of Merit every year since 1991 and winning at least once every year since 1993.

Montgomerie left it as late as possible last year to win a tournament, and even then only shared first place in the final event of the season with Bernhard Langer when their play-off for the Volvo Masters was suspended because of darkness.

The 40-year-old will certainly not be winning the 34th and final Lancome Trophy on Sunday, a third-round 70 leaving him just three under for the tournament.

And after this weekend there are only seven events remaining, with Montgomerie likely to enter only five of those at the most.

The seven-time European number one is down to 32nd in the world rankings, the lowest since he joined at number 36 in 1991, and is currently 21st on the money list, almost £200,000 behind 10th place.

And he will not be making much of a dent in that gap this weekend, occupying 47th place when he finished, worth around £6,000 if that remained the same on Sunday night.

Montgomerie began his third round this morning 12 shots off the lead held by runaway leader Retief Goosen, and had made no inroads into the deficit by the turn.

In fact it took birdies at the fifth and ninth to be out in 36 and get back to two under for the tournament after dropped shots at the first and seventh.

The Scot improved to three under with a birdie on the 13th but was a massive 14 shots off the lead after Goosen picked up three shots in his opening seven holes to move to 17 under.

A bogey on the fifth had briefly reduced the South African’s lead to three shots but after missing out on a birdie on the par five sixth, he picked up a shot on the seventh to restore his overnight cushion.

Belgium’s Nicolas Colsaerts was his nearest challenger, the 20-year-old carding birdies at the first, fifth and sixth to improve to 13 under, one ahead of Ryder Cup hero Paul McGinley.

McGinley, who holed the winning putt against the United States at The Belfry last September, had also picked up three shots to lie 12 under.