Casey goes further clear

England’s Paul Casey quickly added yet another birdie this morning to take a four-stroke lead into the third round of the Telefonica Madrid Open.

Left with three holes of his second round to complete because of a two-hour frost delay yesterday, Casey hit a nine-iron to within a foot of the flag on the 167-yard 17th.

Pars either side of that gave the 26-year-old, seventh on the European Order of Merit this season, a six-under-par 65 to tag on to his opening 63 – and that meant a superb 14-under-par halfway total of 128.

Swede Robert Karlsson stood 10 under after a 67, while joint third one further back were Scots Paul Lawrie and Stephen Gallacher and Australian Peter Fowler.

“It was nice to pick up another shot,” said Casey.

“It was absolutely freezing again and it would have been easy to let one slip. I’m going to set myself a number of something like 10 under for the weekend rather than worry about the guys behind.”

Casey remembered leading the Heineken Classic in Melbourne in January at the same stage – by two – and falling away to joint fourth.

“I managed to lose that one, but win the following week. I don’t want to take the same risk, though. A win is a win.” Next week’s Volvo Masters at Valderrama is worth twice as much.

Casey was partnering defending champion Steen Tinning, who made a sad farewell to the European tour he is now quitting because of back problems.

The 41-year-old Dane ran up a quadruple-bogey eight at the 16th and finished with a 79 for a five-over-par aggregate of 147.

He is exempt for next season’s circuit but is adamant that there will be no re-think on his decision.

“Want a bet?” he replied when it was suggested to him that he will be back.

Meanwhile, Nick Faldo’s hopes of picking up Ryder Cup points ended when he could only par the last four holes and so missed the halfway cut at two over.

Another to miss the cut was Yorkshire's Iain Pyman, who therefore had to wait to see if it cost him his European tour card.

Pyman is in the last exempt spot at the moment and this is the last counting event. The good news for him was not none of those immediately behind him was threatening to overtake him.