Maybank Championship Malaysia 2017: Thursday Leaderboard Scores and Highlights

Scotland's Marc Warren tops the leaderboard after Day 1 of the Maybank Championship in Malaysia, scoring a nine-under 63 early on Thursday morning.

His impressive card was almost matched by Thai golfer Phachara Khongwatmai, who hit a seven-under 65. The rest of the field is predictably tight, with six golfers separated behind the top two on six-under par.

Englishman Danny Willett is among those chasing just behind Warren and Khongwatmai, having putted six birdies on his way to a 66 scorecard.

Here is the leaderboard after Day 1:

#	Name	Score	R1
1	WARREN, Marc	-9	63
2	KHONGWATMAI, Phachara	-7	65
T3	BHULLAR, Gaganjeet	-6	66
T3	BRAZEL, Sam	-6	66
T3	IRAWAN, Arie	-6	66
T3	SIEM, Marcel	-6	66
T3	UIHLEIN, Peter	-6	66
T3	WILLETT, Danny	-6	66
T9	JENSEN, Lasse	-5	67
T9	LEE, Soomin	-5	67

Thursday Recap

A flying start saw Warren hit six-under on the opening nine holes, including an eagle on the eighth, before adding further birdies on the 12th, 14th and 17th to take pole position.

On a sweltering day at the Saujana Golf and Country Club, Warren looked at ease, despite his mixed form of late. The Scot failed to make it past Round 2 at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic earlier in February, carding a five-over 149 over the two rounds, but he looked like a completely different golfer on Thursday.

It was also a marked improvement from last year, as European Tour's tweet indicates:

It was Warren's impressive eagle on the par-five eighth that saw him initially move into the lead, and this was the defining hole of the day. A total of eight golfers—K.T. Kim, Shubhankar Sharma, Piya Swangarunporn, Haotong Li, Michael Tran, Lee Westwood and Nacho Elvira were the others—eagled the eighth, on a day of 11 eagles overall.

Khongwatmai's 65 was one of the highlights of the day, and the young golfer could be set to break a new record in Malaysia, as European Tour pointed out on Twitter:

Willett was the best-performing Englishman on Thursday, teeing off on the 10th and immediately putting a birdie. The 29-year-old added five more and did not bogey on a single hole, catapulting him into joint third on a day in which his putting never faltered:

Speaking afterwards, Willet attributed his success to an ability to stay calm under testing conditions.

"When it's this hot and the wind is swirling, if you can make it as stress-free as possible it's a little bit easier," he said, per the European Tour. "You get frustrated out here and it becomes a long old day.[...] It was relatively stress free for six under which is always nice."

Elsewhere, Malaysian Arie Irawan gave the home fans something to cheer about with his six-under 66. Having made a slow start of five successive pars, Irawan recorded a streak of birdies on the 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th holes, finishing the day in joint third.

But it was Warren who stole the headlines. Here he is speaking at the end of the round:

Things did not go so well for Arjun Atwal, who had a nightmare on the 13th, putting a three-over eight in what was the joint-highest stroke-count for any hole of the day. His poor final score of two-under 70 was largely thanks to this hiccup.

Younghan Song was left similarly frustrated. As one of the last golfers to tee off, the South Korean was four-under after thirteen holes and on track to jump into the top ten—before three consecutive bogies on the 14th, 15th and 16th derailed his challenge.