Lehman on brink of Ryder team

Tom Lehman’s chances of making his own Ryder Cup team were still very much alive with just 10 holes to play in The International tournament in Colorado today.

The 47-year-old American captain could leap from 29th to seventh in the points race with just next week’s United States PGA Championship to come and he stood just one behind American Dean Wilson at Castle Rock.

Lehman has yet to totally rule out being a playing captain at the K Club, saying after the third round: “If I were to make the team I don’t know what to do. That’s the truth.

“But would I play? Probably not, really, because I’m not putting well. I feel like I’d be letting the team down with the putter. I wouldn’t want to deal with that.”

He started the final round of the penultimate counting event in fifth place and was among those to take advantage of a terrible start by overnight leader Zach Johnson, himself ninth in the cup standings and seeking to clinch his first cap.

While Johnson ran up a double-bogey seven on the first and then bogeyed the fourth and fifth, Lehman had three birdies and a bogey in the opening eight.

Under the format of the event – two points for birdies, five for eagles, but minus one for bogeys and minus three for anything worse – he was on 29 points for the week.

Wilson overtook him by going to the turn in a four-under 32, while Lehman shared second spot with the US Tour’s biggest hitter, Bubba Watson, whose round contained an eagle at the long eighth, and Canadian Ian Leggatt.

Sergio Garcia could only par there and when he followed with a first bogey of the day he was down to 23rd spot, seven points behind.