Spaniard Sixto leads by two in Thailand

By VIREN VARMA

SIKHIO, Nakhon Ratchasima (Thailand) —Sixto Casabona-Navarro replicated his first-round performance by shooting another sub-par round to consolidate his lead going into the final round of the MENA Tour's Mountain Creek Open

Starting the day one in front, the 27-year-old Spaniard carded a solid one-under 71 on the demanding Seve Ballesteros-designed course to reach four under for the tournament, two shots clear of Venezuela’s Wolmer Murillo, who usually plies his trade on the Asian Tour.

India’s Manish Goyal and Antonio Costa of Chile shared third a further adrift on one-under as Thailand’s Witchayanon Chothirunrungrueng ended the day three shots off the pace alongside England’s Joe Heraty and Fredrik Lindblom of Sweden.

It was Casabona-Navarro who strengthened his belief that he we can win his first title on the MENA Golf Tour with another tidy showing.

“Again I played a solid tee-to-green game and putted well. Made two great up and downs — on the fourth and seventh — and that kept the momentum going,” said Casabona-navarro.

 “The course is playing tough, but I hit my approaches close to the pin and in the right areas, which made things easier.

“The thinking is to have fun and keep doing what I'm doing, roll some putts in and see where I am coming down the final stretch,” said the Spaniard, whose best finish on the MENA Golf Tour being tied fourth at last year’s Ghala Open in Muscat.

Venezuela’s Murillo, who carded back-to-back 71s, felt he could have done better had his putter been on form. “I played very well and very happy to be in this situation. It would have been nice to have a few better, but just didn’t putt that well.

“If I can get my putter going anything can happen on Thursday,” said the 35-year-old Venezuelan, who will go out with Sixto Casabona-navarro in the final group on Thursday at 11.10am (local time).

Thailand’s Chothirunrungrueng, popularly known as Zoom, returned a second-round 74 to stay in the lead in the amateur division at level par, four shots ahead of India’s Rayhan Thomas.

The rising Thai star, who was two-under after his 14 holes, endured a frustrating finish, dropping four shots, including a double-bogey on the par-3, 16th, in his last four holes, but still kept his hopes alive of posting a strong finish.

Young Thomas responded to an early bogey with an eagle on par-4, fourth which was followed by a birdie on the next, but dropped shots at the seventh and ninth meant he negotiated the front nine in level par.

Two bogeys and two birdies highlighted his inward journey. “I played okay. Made some mistakes, especially the one on the par-5, 17th where a six-foot birdie putt birdie ended up being a bogey six,” he said.

Elsewhere, the English duo of Daniel Owen and Lee Corfield, joint second overnight, slipped to tied eighth after posting an identical 75 as their compatriot Joe Heraty carded a 69, the best score of the day, to move to joint fifth.

SECOND-ROUND SCOREBOARD
par 144 (2x72)

	1		Sixto Casabona-navarro		69	71		140
	2		Wolmer Murillo		71	71		142
	3		Manish Goyal		70	73		143
	3		Antonio Costa		72	71		143
	5		Joe Heraty		75	69		144
	5		Fredrik Lindblom		71	73		144
	5		Witchayanon Chothirunrungrueng [Am]		70	74		144
	8		Daniel Owen		70	75		145
	8		Lee Corfield		70	75		145
	8		Oscar Hertzberg		74	71		145
	11		Fredrik From		74	72		146
	11		Rahul Bajaj		73	73		146
	11		Changtai Sudsom		70	76		146
	14		Jonathan Fransson		74	73		147
	14		Max Williams		74	73		147
	14		Craig Hinton		74	73		147
	14		Ryan Laird		73	74		147
	14		Sung-Keun Kim		72	75		147
	19		Rayhan Thomas [Am]		76	72		148
	19		Stuart Archibald		73	75		148
	19		Daniel Kay		76	72		148
	19		Mariano Ochoa		72	76		148
	19		Blake Snyder		74	74		148
	24		Paul Doherty		76	73		149
	24		Elliott Oxlade		75	74		149
	24		Jesper Alm		76	73		149
	24		Kevin Esteve		76	73		149
	28		Clarke Lutton		74	76		150
	28		Luke Joy		77	73		150
	28		Rocco Sanjust		73	77		150
	31		Benjamin David [Am]		79	72		151
	31		Victor Bertran		75	76		151
	31		Jean-Luc Burnier		76	75		151
	31		Joshua Seale		74	77		151
	31		Michael Dreyer		74	77		151
	31		Gonzalo Escauriaza		72	79		151
	37		Jonny McAllister		78	74		152
	38		Mark Chamberlain		71	82		153
	38		Scott Campbell		79	74		153
	38		Jordan Garnish		79	74		153
	41		Karl Ableidinger		75	79		154
	41		Borja Cabello		81	73		154
	41		Carlos Balmaseda		79	75		154
	41		Francisco Perez		77	77		154
	45		Josh Taylor		78	77		155
	45		Joshua Ingram		73	82		155
	45		Fredrik Edmunds		78	77		155
	48		Peter Stojanovski		79	77		156
	49		Gregor Kotnik		81	76		157
	49		Robert Harris		76	81		157
	49		Karl Russell		77	80		157
	52		Ben Alexander [Am]		80	78		158

Missed Cut

		Romain Caro		87	83	-	170 (*)
		David Anderson		82	82	-	164 (*)
		Tom Boys		80	83	-	163 (*)
		Aaron Leitmannstetter		85	76	-	161 (*)
		Edward Barry-Walsh		81	80	-	161 (*)
		Louis Campbell		81	80	-	161 (*)
		James Perkinson		80	80	-	160 (*)
		Andi Dill		80	80	-	160 (*)
		Altaaf Bux		82	77	-	159 (*)
		Kalle Nilsson		79	80	-	159 (*)
		James Ashman		79	79	-	158 (*)
		Divyanshu Bajaj		78	80	-	158 (*)
		Adam Ward		79	-	-	(WD)