DUBAI, United Arab Emirates \u2014 Patrick Reed will take a four-stroke lead into the final round of the Dubai Desert Classic after shooting 5-under 67 on Saturday, as Rory McIlroy\u2019s chances of a record-extending fifth title virtually disappeared.<\/p>\n
Reed, the former Masters champion who now plays on the LIV Golf circuit, tapped in at No. 18 for his seventh birdie of the third round at Emirates Golf Club to move onto 14-under 202 for the week.<\/p>\n
Leading the chase was David Puig, another LIV player, who shot 66 to jump to second place. A further shot back was Viktor Hovland, who had a 65 that tied the lowest round of the day, and Andy Sullivan (71).<\/p>\n
\u201cI know it\u2019s not going to be easy, it never is, and doesn\u2019t matter how big of a lead you have,\u201d said Reed, who won nine times on the PGA Tour \u2014 including at Augusta National in 2018 \u2014 before joining LIV in 2022.<\/p>\n
As a LIV player, the American won LIV Golf in Dallas last year and then in Hong Kong on the Asian Tour in 2024.<\/p>\n
As for No. 2-ranked McIlroy, the tournament headliner started the round seven strokes behind overnight leader Reed and talking up his chances of a weekend charge on a course where he has won four times.<\/p>\n
The Northern Irishman made par on each of his first nine holes and bogeyed the last after missing a 2-foot par putt to shoot 71, and was 11 back.<\/p>\n
Tommy Fleetwood, ranked No. 3, has yet to break par this week after adding a 73 to rounds of 73 and 72.<\/p>\n
Another high-profile name, Tyrrell Hatton, made six bogeys in a 76 to drop to a tie for 42nd.<\/p>\n
Puig has already won on the European tour in the 2026 season \u2014 at the Australian PGA Championship in November \u2014 and the 24-year-old Spaniard was tied for third at the Dubai Invitational last week.<\/p>\n
Hovland eyes second title<\/p>\n
Hovland\u2019s last win on the European tour was at the Dubai Desert Classic in 2022, when he started the final round six back and triumphed in a playoff over Richard Bland.<\/p>\n
The No. 14-ranked Norwegian has changed his swing in recent years and still doesn\u2019t feel entirely comfortable, despite being bogey-free on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cStill doesn\u2019t feel like I can stand on the tee and kind of swing for the fences and swing loosely,\u201d said Hovland, who is playing his first event of 2026. \u201cIt\u2019s all very contrived and manufactured, and it happened to go straight today. If I get off the tee and in a decent position, I can really do some damage.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I really would like to be able to stand on the tee box and swing hard and know that the ball is going to go fairly straight.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DUBAI, United Arab Emirates \u2014 Patrick Reed will take a four-stroke lead into the final round of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":428152,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-428151","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}