Key events<\/p>\n
An opening birdie for the 2011 champion Darren Clarke. He\u2019s +2. Apropos of nothing, and just because I happen to have the stat to hand, so may as well share it, Clarke is joint holder of the record for most appearances by an Open champion before his first victory. That\u2019s 19, after his 2011 win, and he shares the number with Phil Mickelson (2013). Nick Price (1994) is next on the list.<\/p>\n
Share<\/a><\/p>\n Birdie for Jackson Suber at 2, and the leader stretches his advantage at the top! He tugged his drive into the rough down the left, but got a decent lie, and was able to wedge over the flag from 90 yards to 12 feet. One fairly straight roll later, and he moves to -6. Meanwhile Laurie Canter nearly aces the 4th. His tee shot lands just past the bunker guarding the front left and serenely glides to kick-in distance, though it was never threatening to drop, always on a route below the hole. The 36-year-old Englishman is -2.<\/p>\n -6: Suber (2) Share<\/a><\/p>\n A second birdie of the morning for Matt Wallace. He lays up at the drivable par-four 5th, and it\u2019s a good decision. A wedge to eight feet, and a putt poured straight into the cup. A fast start, and the first significant change to the overnight leaderboard.<\/p>\n -5: Suber (1) Share<\/a><\/p>\n Suber wedges his second at 1 to 12 feet, and he\u2019s left with a very makeable putt. A little bit of left-to-right movement. He absolutely rattles it through the break, and leaves himself a testing five footer coming back. That one goes in confidently to save his par. A strange mix of three nerveless strokes and one jittery one. He made 207 feet of putts yesterday; there\u2019s another 22 feet and seven inches to his running total.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n If Suber is feeling the nerves this morning, they\u2019ve not been betrayed by his opening tee shot. A confident drive, striped down the middle of the fairway. He\u2019s going around with Sami Valimaki, who became the first Finnish player to win on the PGA Tour<\/a> last year, with victory at the RSM Classic. It was Valimaki\u2019s 28th birthday yesterday, and the gallery sang Happy Birthday to him on 18. \u201cI thought that was pretty cool,\u201d said Suber.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n Suber seems to be enjoying discovering life on this side of the pond. He\u2019d never been to Europe before, but has travelled \u201cpretty much everywhere in Latin American and Canada\u201d. He thinks the UK is \u201cawesome \u2026 the golf is really cool, and just the towns, how the train system works.\u201d He went into Liverpool earlier this week with pal Pierceson Coody and partners. \u201cThat was really cool to see a European city.\u201d And when he was asked why he\u2019s not going to try driving on the other side of the road, he gave a reply as tinder-dry as the Birkdale rough: \u201cBecause I\u2019m trying to make it here for four days.\u201d<\/p>\n Jackson Suber teeing off on the first hole on Friday. Photograph: Phil Noble\/ReutersShare<\/a><\/p>\n Updated at\u00a002.40 EDT<\/p>\n Now then, our 18-hole leader Jackson Suber. Or to give him his full name, John Weatherington Suber III. He\u2019s 26 years old, from Tampa, Florida, and is in his second year on the PGA Tour<\/a> since moving up from the Korn Ferry. His best finish to date is the tie for fourth at this year\u2019s Canadian Open that got him into this championship. He subsequently missed the cut at the US Open, and only played his first round of links golf this Monday. And now he\u2019s bidding to become the 11th player to win the Open on debut. For the record, here are the other ten \u2026<\/p>\n Willie Park Sr (Prestwick) 1860 Share<\/a><\/p>\n Matt Wallace has never really built on his early promise of the late 2010s, when he won four European Tour<\/a> events and tied for third at the 2019 PGA Championship. But the Londoner got his career back on track a couple of years ago with a win at the European Masters and a PGA Tour alternate event \u2026 so perhaps, now 36, it transpires that he\u2019s going to be a late bloomer after all? A decent opening round of 69 yesterday afternoon, and now he\u2019s birdied the opening hole this morning. He\u2019s -2.<\/p>\n Share<\/a><\/p>\n The surprise leader Jackson Suber is out early, at 7.30am BST. Other than that, it\u2019s a nice quiet start to day two. The calm before the storm. Though of course there\u2019ll be no actual storm. On that subject, hats off to Sky Sports for their continued use of \u2026<\/p>\n<\/p>\n You can come on out now.Share<\/a>Preamble<\/p>\n \u2026 and we\u2019re back<\/a>. Just over nine hours ago, the first day of the 154th edition of the Open Championship came to a close. Now we\u2019re up and running again! Friday promises to be another monster trek, and we\u2019ll be blogging about it \u266b\u266a all day looooooonng\u266b\u266a<\/a>. Here\u2019s how the very top of the leaderboard looked at the end of play last night \u2026<\/p>\n -5: Jackson Suber \u2026 and here are the tee times (BST). Off we go! It\u2019s on!<\/p>\n 6.46 am: Eugenio Chacarra, Matt Wallace, Max Greyserman
-4: Im, Brown<\/p>\n
-4: Im, Brown
-3: Wallace (5), Coody, C Young, Detry, MacIntyre, Molinari, Smalley, DeChambeau, Gerard, Daffue<\/p>\n
Tom Kidd (St Andrews) 1873
Mungo Park (Musselburgh) 1874
Jock Hutchison (St Andrews) 1921
Denny Shute (St Andrews) 1933
Ben Hogan (Carnoustie) 1953
Tony Lema (St Andrews) 1964
Tom Watson (Carnoustie) 1975
Ben Curtis (Royal St George\u2019s) 2003
Collin Morikawa (Royal St George\u2019s) 2021<\/p>\n
-4: Im Sung-jae, Daniel Brown
-3: Thomas Detry, Robert MacIntyre, Francesco Molinari, Alex Smalley, Bryson DeChambeau, Ryan Gerard, MJ Daffue, Pierceson Coody, Cameron Young<\/p>\n
6.57 am: Michael Brennan, Sahith Theegala, Laurie Canter
7.08 am: Cameron Smith, Keith Mitchell, Stuart Grehan (a)
7.19 am: Sepp Straka, Joaquin Niemann, Kurt Kitayama
7.30 am: Sami Valimaki, Shaun Norris, Jackson Suber
7.41 am: Darren Clarke, Adrien Saddier, Bernd Wiesberger
7.52 am: Keegan Bradley, Corey Conners, Casey Jarvis
8.03 am: Matt McCarty, Harry Hall, Haotong Li
8.14 am: Padraig Harrington, Marco Penge, Michael Hollick
8.25 am: Tom Kim, Billy Horschel, Mason Howell (a)
8.26 am: Johnny Kiefer, Pierceson Coody, Keita Nakajima
8.47 am: Aldrich Potgieter, Jesper Svansson, Jack Buchanan (a)
9.03 am: Bud Cauley, Jayden Schaper, Lucas Herbert
9.14 am: Kristoffer Reitan, Patrick Reed, JT Poston
9.25 am: Chris Gotterup, Sam Burns, Adam Scott
9.36 am: Collin Morikawa, JJ Spaun, Nicolai Hojgaard
9.47 am: Shane Lowry, Aaron Rai, Brooks Koepka
9.58 am: Cameron \u2060Young, Wyndham Clark, Luvig Aberg
10.09 am: Rory McIlroy, Xander Schauffele, Matt Fitzpatrick
10.20 am: Jacob Bridgeman, Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen, Tim Wiedemeyer (a)
10.31 am: Patrick Cantlay, Daniel Berger, Nico Echavarria
10.42 am: \u200bPeter Uihlein, Alistair Docherty, Francesco Laporta
10.53 am: Cameron John, Austen Truslow, Sam Bairstow
11.04 am: Naoyuki \u200bKataoka, Marcus Plunkett, Baard Bjoernevik Skogen
11.15 am: Kazuki Higa, Jiho Yang, Nevill Ruiter (a)
11.41 am: Matthew Baldwin, Thomas Detry, James Nicholas
11.52 am: Michael Kim, Daniel Hillier, Andy Sullivan
12.03 pm: Ryan Fox, Andrew Novak, Matthew Jordan
12.14 pm: Henrik Stenson, Max Homa, Joe Dean
12.25 pm: Robert MacIntyre, Rickie \u200bFowler, Alex Fitzpatrick
12.36 pm: David Duval, Martin Couvra, Matthew \u200cSouthgate
12.47 pm: Sungjae Im, Daniel Brown, \u200bFifa Laopakdee (a)
12.58 pm: Gary Woodland, Jake Knapp, Jordan Smith
1.09 pm: \u200bFrancesco Molinari, Tom McKibbin, Lev Grinberg (a)
1.20 pm: Hennie Du Plessis, Jose Luis Ballester, Dan Bradbury
1.31 pm: Angel Ayora, Victor Perez, Mateo Pulcini (a)
1.42 pm: Stewart Cink, Scott Vincent, Joakim Lagergren
1.53 pm: Michael Thorbjornsen, Kota Kaneko, Travis Smyth
2.09 pm: Alex Smalley, Sam Stevens, Ryo Hisatsune
2.20 pm: Akshay Bhatia, Harris English, Rasmus Hojgaard
2.31 pm: Ben Griffin, Hideki Matsuyama, Min Woo Lee
2.42 pm: Russell Henley, Justin Rose, Viktor Hovland
2.53 pm: Justin Thomas, Alex Noren, Jason Day
3.04 pm: Scottie Scheffler, Tyrrell Hatton, Bryson DeChambeau
3.15 pm: Jordan Spieth, Tommy Fleetwood, Jon Rahm
3.26 pm: Brian Harman, Si Woo Kim, Nick Taylor
3.37 pm: Ryan Gerard, Maverick McNealy, David Puig
3.48 pm: Kazuma Kobori, Tom Sloman, David Howard (a)
3.59 pm: Antoine Rozner, Ren Yonezawa, Caleb Surratt
4.10 pm: MJ Daffue, Frederic Lacroix, Jack McDonald
4.21 pm: Jeongwoo Ham, \u200cRyutaro Nagano, Alejandro De Castro Piera (a)<\/p>\n