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Day two digest: 2020 WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational
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Day two digest: 2020 WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational

Brendon Todd putted his way to the summit following a very early start to proceedings on day two of the WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational.

Brendon Todd

Here is everything you need to know from Friday's second round at TPC Southwind.

Todd's putting masterclass

While others struggled to keep the bogeys off their cards on Friday, Todd eased his way to the top of the leaderboard and holed some absolute beauties along the way. The pick of the bunch came at the par three 14th where he drained a 50 footer to pull away from the chasing pack. Here's how he saw it... "It was a little bit in between clubs there, so I shot six iron to the left side of the green, safe shot, and had 50 feet over the mound. It was breaking left to right five or six feet. My caddie really set me up with a good spot there beyond the hole to aim at and I just focused all on speed. It happened to just drift right there in the middle of the hole. Bonus birdie but that's what you've got to do to win golf tournaments sometimes and that's how you shoot low rounds."

Rahm chooses sand to ensure he stays on dry land

When was the last time you deliberately chose to put yourself in a greenside bunker? Well that's exactly what World Number One Jon Rahm did on Friday. After finding himself in a tricky spot in the left rough after two shots, and with water behind the green, Rahm opted to play his third straight into the sand to give himself a safer shot. And he very nearly holed it...

Fitzpatrick lands eagle

Although the scoring was generally pretty low on Friday, only two men managed to put an eagle on their cards. One of them was Englishman Matthew Fitzpatrick, who rolled in from 53 feet at the long third to go under par for the tournament. He went on to finish the day on six under after adding five birdies and a single bogey. He said: "I just hit the ball really solid and the last two days I've putted unbelievable. I've got a lot of it down to that and hopefully just keep going over the weekend."

Matthew Fitzpatrick

No putter required for Fleetwood

After sending his tee shot at the 18th into a bunker and having to chop out on to the fairway, it looked like the best Tommy Fleetwood could hope for was a par save to head into the weekend on level par. But he had other ideas. The Ryder Cup star holed his approach shot from 106 yards to make it back to back birdies and get to one under. He said: "The back nine was a bit of a roller coaster, I'll be honest; 18 in particular. With the tee being moved forward, it was almost a harder tee shot in a way, a little bit more uncomfortable. Got to take driver, I didn't want to hit less, hook it in the trap on the right. The ball was head high it felt like nearly in the trap, got it out and ended up with a pretty good wedge number and it was in."

Fowler closes the gap

Having started his round at 7.10am as the tee times were brought forward in anticipation of inclement weather, Todd looked certain to take a huge lead into the weekend after setting the clubhouse target of 11 under in beautiful morning conditions before wind picked up on Friday afternoon. No one was threatening to eat into his four shot advantage until Rickie Fowler's late flurry of birdies catapulted him into solo second. He sent his approach at the 17th to three feet and tapped in for a birdie before chipping in from off the green at the last to close the gap on Todd to two shots.

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