Scott Jamieson’s dreams of a BMW PGA Championship title came apart in the space of four holes of his third round at Wentworth with five strokes lost to knock him out of the lead.
The Glaswegian had moved into the lead on his own having started the day tied with two others but two double bogeys in the space of three holes send him plummeting down the leaderboard.
From being a co-leader he ended the day in a tie for eighth place five shots off the lead set by Australia’s unheralded Andrew Dodt.
On a cooler and more blustery day on the West Course Jamieson had opened strongly with solid pars at the first five holes and saw co-leaders Thomas Pieters and Francesco Molinari make early errors to leave him alone in the lead.
Both bogeyed the first and Pieters followed with a double at the third, but just as Jamieson seemed to be in control his round fell apart all too quickly.
At the sixth he drove wide left, could only hack out sideways and then three-putted from 40 feet for a double bogey.
Then at the eighth he attempted a bold line from perfect position in the fairway to a pin close to the water hazard and came up wet, and another double bogey dropped him all the way back to three-under.
Another shot went at the ninth and then at the short tenth he missed the green long and left, chipped out to eight feet and missed for a bogey to drop to one-under, no longer even the leading Scot in the field as Richie Ramsay had finished with a 71 to stand at two-under.
A birdie at the long 12th got the momentum going the other way, and he added a birdie at the 17th but a 76 wasn’t nearly enough for the 33-year-old to stay on the pace being set by Australian Dodt and South African Branden Grace.
Dodt hadn’t made much of a splash after two 70s and was par for the day until he started a tear from the 11th with four birdies on the back nine to soar into a share of the lead.
Grace, still riding the controversy from his questionable free drop in a bunker on Thursday, was one-over at the turn before got on a roll with three successive birdies as he made the turn for home. A fourth at the short 14th put him level with Dodt, but he dropped a shot at the long 17th just as he looked set to make a strong finish.
That left the 31-year-old from New South Wales, whose two Tour victories so far have both come in co-sanctioned events in Asia, on his own at the head of the field.
There were big names gathering behind the Australian for tomorrow’s final round, with Lee Westwood getting with three of the lead with three closing birdies. Molinari steadied the ship to finish at five-under while Ireland’s Shane Lowry is close at four-under going into the final day.
