By the time those at the business end of the leaderboard took to the tee, the weather was already showing signs of improvement. The final round was played in threesomes, and the final trio comprised leader Gonzalo Fernandez Castano of Spain on 14-under, and Martin Kaymer of Germany together with South African Retief Goosen on 13-under.
Kaymer made an early bogey on 2 to offer Gonzalo some breathing space, but he took back the stroke on 3 and when Gonzalo bogeyed 4 that left the two tied for the lead. Goosen bogeyed 4 as well, but then birdied 5 to join the other two at thirteen-under. Then both Goosen and Kaymer birdied 6, and that put the pair who had shared second place overnight into the lead.
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Retief Goosen looks pensive on the 7th green, as well he might. He was about to drop the first of six strokes in only five holes.
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At that point the smart money would probably have rested on the experience of two-time Major-winner Goosen, but he immediately went into an extraordinary sequence of missed greens and missed putts to drop six strokes in only five holes, with four bogeys and a double from 7 through 11. It must have been all the more frustrating for him that having ejected himself from contention, he made a late comeback with three birdies on 13, 15 and 16 to finish on 11-under – what a difference those six lost strokes made.
Meanwhile, Kaymer made another birdie on 8 to put himself two strokes in front and take a clear lead that he would never relinquish. Gonzalo, so fluent on the Saturday, could not get his game going. The iron approaches and long putts that had served him so well in the third round were nowhere to be seen, and he could not find the birdies he needed to put Kaymer under pressure.
Kaymer did suffer a minor glitch on 11 and 12. He bogeyed the par-3 11th, then found a bunker with his tee-shot on 12 and could not hit the green in regulation. He left himself with a horrible up and down to save par, but he made it and that was probably the critical point in his round.
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Perhaps the key moment of the final day - Kaymer chips dead to save par and hold on to the lead.
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Behind the leaders not a great deal was happening. High hopes had been held out for Lee Westwood to make a final-day move. Along with playing partner Soren Kjeldsen of Denmark he made a couple of birdies on the front nine, and both briefly found themselves within a stroke or two of the lead. But they could not push on, and on the back nine they both dropped strokes and their challenge was over.
Any threat was coming from further back. Starting on six-under, England's Ross Fisher fought his way to eleven-under, but dropped a stroke on 17 to finish in a tie for 8th with Westwood. From a healthy position on Saturday morning Adam Scott had lost a lot of ground. Starting at seven-under on the final day Scott made one birdie on the front nine and four more on the back nine. His bogey-free round of 66 took him to twelve-under and a tie for 4th with Kjeldsen, but it was just too little and just too late.
I had said after the third round that I thought the farthest back that any real challenge could come from was eight-under. The three players on that score included two Major-winners, Ernie Els of South Africa and Australia's Geoff Ogilvy. But in fact it was the third member of the trio, Raphael Jacquelin, who almost came good.
