Japanese golf was in disarray when Australian coach Gareth Jones took over as head coach four years ago. The golf-mad country had performed terribly at the 2014 World Amateur Teams Championship on home soil when the women tied for eighth and the men shared 29th.

The humiliation sparked an international search for a coaching director and Jones emerged as the saviour with a licence to transform the high- performance system. The Japan Golf Association opted for an Australian coach so that players had to start speaking English and have a mindset of playing professionally in America and Europe.

It’s proved to be a superb decision, with Jones’ star student Takumi Kanaya firing a six-under 65 to share the lead at the 2019 Emirates Australian Open.

Kanaya, 21, is the world’s No.1 amateur and arrived in Sydney with a big reputation. Yet his previous visit to the Jack Nicklaus-designed Australian Golf Club yielded a second-round 85 and an early flight home. They were clearly distant memories as the 2018 Asia Pacific Amateur champion rattled off four consecutive birdies from the 11th to the 14th before he drained two more long-range efforts to overtake local boy Matt Jones.

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“I learned (the) Australian golf style,” Kanaya said after his round. ” I just (knew) Japanese golf style before I was 17 years old. Now I have I have confidence, but I have three more days, so I will do my best tomorrow.”

He was joined late in the day by Chinese Taipei’s Chun-An Yu, also 21, who rolled in consecutive birdies to finish the day at 65 as well, making it an all-amateur affair at the top of the leaderboard on a day that saw some of the big guns struggle as Sydney’s skies looked apocalyptic with bushfire smoke and ash.

Tournament favourite Adam Scott looked well off his game and had to wait until the very last hole for his first birdie of the day, leaving him at four-over and with plenty of work to do Friday.

Cameron Smith enjoyed the early morning conditions, firing a three-under 68 to be in a strong position. He was joined by international stars Paul Casey and Louis Oosthuizen.

Marc Leishman sits a two-under, while Spanish sensation Sergio Garcia battled hard in the afternoon wind, closing out with a one-under 70.