Padraig harries Rose

Padraig Harrington conjured up a miraculous opening birdie and after two holes had already cancelled out Justin Rose’s four-shot lead when their Volvo Masters and Order of Merit duel resumed at Valderrama today.

When the Open champion hooked into the trees off the first tee and Rose hit a beauty right down the middle the odds were on the latter stretching his advantage.

But where Harrington’s ball finished in the rough left him with an eight-foot gap in the branches of a tree directly in front of him, he hit the shot to 15 feet and made the birdie putt to improve to one under.

Rose, on the other hand, made a mess of his pitch and his chip from just off the green and failed to sink his nine-foot par putt.

The 27-year-old, who has to finish ahead of Harrington and be in the top three to overtake both him and table-topping Ernie Els on the money list, was back to three under as a result – and worse was to come for him.

Off another decent drive down the 421-yard second he failed to find the green once more and left his first chip short of the putting surface.

His next attempt came up 12 feet short and when that missed a double-bogey six went on his card and the pair were level.

Harrington, defending the Order of Merit crown he won last year by finishing second in the same event, also has to finish third this time to move ahead of the absent Els, but for him that will be enough if Rose is alongside him.

It was the worst possible start to the day for Rose, who despite his rise to 12th in the world this year has not actually won a tournament since last November’s Australian Masters.

Yorkshire’s Simon Dyson had moved into third place and on level par after five was only one behind in the separate battle for the £467,644 first prize.