Trophee Hassan II 2016: Friday Leaderboard Scores and Highlights
Francesco Laporta soared to the summit of the 2016 Trophee Hassan II leaderboard on Friday and took a one-shot lead into the Royal Golf Dar Es Salam clubhouse in Morocco after shooting a round of two-under par.
The Italian pulled clear of the pack after ending Thursday's first round as one of three joint leaders tied at the top, with Spain's Borja Virto Astudillo, Australia's Jason Scrivener and South Korea's Jeunghun Wang tight on his heels.
Laporta endured a mixed second round but managed to recover from his first double bogey of the tournament and enters the weekend's action on top of the pile, bagging an impressive six birdies in Friday's outing.
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Read on for a recap of Friday's action and a breakdown of the leaderboard's top 10 after Friday's cut.
| 1 | Francesco Laporta | -6 | 68 | 70 |
| T2 | Jason Scrivener | -5 | 69 | 70 |
| T2 | Borja Virto Astudillo | -5 | 68 | 71 |
| T2 | Jeunghun Wang | -5 | 71 | 68 |
| T5 | Daniel Im | -4 | 71 | 69 |
| T5 | Zander Lombard | -4 | 70 | 70 |
| T5 | Peter Lawrie | -4 | 71 | 69 |
| T8 | Gary King | -3 | 71 | 70 |
| T8 | Adrien Saddier | -3 | 69 | 72 |
| T10 | Nacho Elvira | -2 | 71 | 71 |
| T10 | Christiaan Bezuidenhout | -2 | 72 | 70 |
| T10 | Joshua White | -2 | 73 | 69 |
| T10 | Scott Henry | -2 | 71 | 71 |
| T10 | Jack Senior | -2 | 72 | 70 |
| T10 | Jose-Felipe Lima | -2 | 72 | 70 |
| T10 | Kristofer Mueck | -2 | 72 | 70 |
All scorecard information via EuropeanTour.com.
Recap
Some might have seen Laporta's recent joint-fourth-place finish at the Challenge de Madrid and thought the 25-year-old was capable of vying for the crown in Morocco this weekend, where he's proving to be a handful.
A third-round score of five-over par in Madrid proved to be his undoing in an otherwise glittering tournament run, and Laporta is once again showing topsy-turvy form in North Africa.
After opening Friday's outing with two birdies in his first three holes, Laporta shot a bogey on the 13th and double bogey on the 14th—having started on the back nine—bringing his score to one-over par and ruining his progress.
But he had the fortitude to bounce back and birdied four of the next six holes, including a calmly held seven-yard putt on the second, as shown by the official European Tour Twitter account:
Laporta finally managed to unearth some consistency, and apart from a bogey on the eighth, he parred each of his remaining holes to finish the day at two under and ensure he took a lead into the clubhouse, albeit a slim one.
Like the Italian, Wang might have also ended his day under a brighter banner were it not for a bogey on his second-to-last hole, but the South Korean was otherwise in sensational form. One of his finest moments of the second round was a long-range birdie putt on the par-four 11th, one of six he recorded on the day:
Wang's recovery at the end of his outing was particularly impressive, as he swiftly bounced back from a bogey on the 17th to birdie the 18th, something only three of the leaderboard's top 10 managed in the second round.
Onlookers at the Royal Golf Dar Es Salam course also had to be vigilant, however, after some unwelcome guests were spotted sneaking a peak at the action:
Neither Scrivener nor Astudillo could match Laporta's wild play on Friday after shooting rounds of two-under and one-under, respectively, but both joint-second-placed runners are still within reach of the perch.
France's Thomas Linard made the biggest plummet of the day and fell from contention to one-over par after shooting a 77. He dropped a total of 34 places from which he'll struggle to come back.
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