Vincent Tshabalala and Ernie Els took the first round lead of the Nelson Mandela Invitational presented by Coca-Cola on eight-under par at the Arabella Country Estate course on Saturday.
The South African duo carded 12 birdies between them in the betterball format, but both bouble-bogeyed the third and bogeyed the 11th which cost them at least one shot.
But they dovetailed well on most of the other holes to ensure that they held a one stroke lead over three teams on seven-under.
”I had an awesome day, it was really unfortunate about the bogies at the third and the 11th,” Els said. ”We had a few chances and there were a lot of birdies to be made out there.” Among the chasing pack was the fourball of tournament host Gary Player, who was in the company of Andrew McLardy, businessman David Lyons and female golfer Ashleigh Simon.
The 15-year-old Simon, who is the South African Open Champion produced sparkling golf, which included an inward nine of 31 to leave her playing partners wide-eyed at her potential.
She provided the team with much needed scoring as her team ended the days as joint leaders at 19-under par in the fourball alliance competition.
It was Tshabalala’s putting that had his team-mates, Els, former Springbok captain Francois Pienaar and businessman Hugh Connerty agog.
”He is best putter I’ve played with in a long time,” Els said. ”He is amazing to watch.” Els, who has enjoyed a superb year, carded four birdies on the back nine but also had two bogeys in an up and down round on the difficult par-72 layout.
Tshabalala also struggled with a bogey and a double-bogey on the front nine, which he offset with birdies at two, five, six and eight.
”The last time I played with Ernie was 1985 it was an incredible experience to play with him today, the man really has the best swing in the game,” Tshabalala said.
”He is the best striker of the ball out there. For all of us the most enjoyable thing was the team captain, Francois Pienaar, he kept giving us talk through out the day and he told us on the last hole not to ‘screw it up.’.”
Connerty, who was making his fourth appearance at the NMI summed up the feeling in the fourball when he said: ”I played with the world’s greatest putter, the world’s greatest golf swing and the world greatest team captain, I was simply the glue that kept it together.” Pienaar added: ”Playing with Ernie was special, Vincent was such an inspiration and Hugh is just such a fierce competitor. I started badly but when the nerves settled down I played a lot better.”
The fourball of Bobby Lincoln, Tim Clark, Lucas Radebe and Zanosi Kunene were disqualified from the competition following a misunderstanding on the 14th hole.
Three players picked up when two needed to finish the hole and because of this oversight they were disqualified although Lincoln and Clark will still compete in the betterball format on Sunday. – Sapa