NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pennsylvania, May 15 (Reuters) – Defending champion Scottie Scheffler made a slow start to the PGA Championship second round at Aronimink Golf Club on Friday and quickly relinquished his share of the overnight lead while Hideki Matsuyama moved into contention on a bunched leaderboard.
The day’s action began with a staggering 48 players within three shots of co-leaders Scheffler, Martin Kaymer, Aldrich Potgieter, Stephan Jaeger, Min Woo Lee, Ryo Hisatsune and Alex Smalley who opened with matching three-under 67s.
World number one Scheffler, who started on the back nine, bogeyed three of his first four holes as he struggled to find the fairways before a birdie at the par-three 17th where his tee shot settled 22 inches from the cup.
He reached the turn at two over for the round having hit just one fairway.
Smalley, playing one group behind Scheffler, birdied the par-five 16th to grab the outright lead. Kaymer, who won the 2010 PGA Championship and joined LIV Golf in 2022, quickly fell back after five bogeys over his first seven holes while the other four overnight co-leaders had afternoon tee times.
Matsuyama, who began the day three shots off the lead, made a move with three birdies and was bogey-free with four holes to play in his round.
Masters champion Rory McIlroy, whose 74 was the second time in his PGA Championship career that he was four-over par or worse in the opening round, is one of the big names in danger of missing the cut. He tees off at 2:05 p.m. ET (1805 GMT).
Twice major winner Bryson DeChambeau, runner-up at the PGA Championship in the last two years, will be two groups ahead of McIlroy’s threesome and will also need to do plenty of work to reach the weekend after opening with a nightmare 76.
(Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; Editing by Ken Ferris)
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