Hoylake (Liverpool), Jul 20 (PTI) India's Shubhankar Sharma, playing his third Open Championships in a week when he celebrates his 27th birthday, made a solid start with back-to-back birdies and was 2-under through five holes of the first round here.

Sharma, who was in the third last group, missed birdies on the first and second when his putts just went past, finally holed them nicely on the fourth and fifth holes. In fact, he had an eagle putt from almost 25-feet on the fifth which was 3-4 feet short, and he duly birdied it.

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The two-time winner on the DP World Tour, Sharma is playing his third Open and has been tied 51st on both previous occasions in 2018 and 2019.

A 6-foot-8-inch 22-year-old amateur Christo Lamprecht of South Africa, who came into the tournament by winning The (British) Amateur Championships at Southport last month, shot 5-under 66 and took the early clubhouse lead.

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Lamprecht shared the lead with Tommy Fleetwood, 32, who was born in Southport. Lamprecht had seven birdies against two bogeys while Fleetwood had six birdies and one bogey.

Lamprecht is a senior at Georgia Tech in US, from where the 2009 Open winner Stewart Cink also comes.

Cink, now 50, and also playing on the Champions Tour (for over 50s) was tied fourth with the 2023 US Open winner, Wyndham Clarke. They shot 68 and were among six players at 3-under and more could join the bunch as almost half the field was yet to complete their second round.

Frenchman Antoine Rozner, trying for a Ryder Cup place on the European Team, was sole third with 67.

A big bunch of players including Jordan Spieth were at 2-under and it included India's Shubhankar Sharma, who had played only five holes.

Lamprecht said, "I'm very hard on myself, and I think I earned my spot to be here."

"I think the way I played today I earned to be on the top of the leaderboard, as of now.

"I just personally think I believe in myself, and I guess stepping on to the first tee box if you're a professional or a competitor, you should be believing that you should be the best standing there."

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)