[Photo: Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images]
For all the eclectic ingredients this BMW Australian PGA Championship has offered up for three days, the most compelling of all is the complete absence of any certainty in the outcome.
After 54 holes of stop-start golf, we are set for an uninterrupted final round where nine players from five different countries will begin Sunday within two shots of the lead.
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Tied at the top at 13-under-par are local hope Anthony Quayle [pictured], who compiled a tidy 67 with Steve Williams on the bag, Spain’s David Puig (65) and Portugal’s Ricardo Gouveia (66). Breathing down their necks are Min Woo Lee (67) and Kazuma Kobori (69) at 12-under. At 11-under sit Adam Scott (66), Marc Leishman (67), China’s Wenyi Ding (69) and Kiwi Daniel Hiller (67).
Five more players are 10-under, just three strokes off the pace.
Saturday at Royal Queensland Golf Club began with 21 players needing to complete their third round, including the group of Will Florimo, Quinnton Croker and Gregorio De Leo, who all had one hole remaining in their second round that they each needed to birdie in order to make the cut. The fact that all three did was just the start of an entertaining day’s golf.
Third-round action was plagued by one of the more specious cessations for weather in recent tournament memory. Players were hauled off the course at 11:15am because officials were concerned about storm activity and high winds in the area. Neither came even close to eventuating, robbing the venue of many of its spectators who were advised to evacuate during the break. Many didn’t return.
Those who did witnessed one of the best third-round sorties in Australian PGA Championship history. It was true blink-and-you’ll-miss-it stuff.
Second-round leader Kobori parried an early charge from Quayle, who quickly birdied the second and third holes. The short-hitting Kiwi countered by birdieing the opening two holes before reeling off 16 straight pars to remain firmly in the mix.
All those who completed today at double-digits under par moved into the frame at various points, with Gouveia and Puig authoring an Iberian pincer movement on the championship. The Portuguese golfer, who once ranked as high as 77th in the world but now sits 459th, looked most likely to own the outright lead, however he bogeyed the 16th hole to fall back to 13-under. Puig was bogey-free but couldn’t find a birdie in the last three holes to break clear.
Quayle shapes as the most irresistible tale among the leaders, given his local connections and famous caddie. That a victory would provide two years of job security on the DP World Tour only adds to the Queenslander’s appeal as the champion.
Not that he’s getting too far ahead of himself. Instead, Quayle is feeding off his fast finish at the same course and in the same tournament a year ago.
“That last round was just such a massive momentum shift with my career in recent times, and I think tomorrow could be another chance to take it another step further,” said Quayle, who shot 63 on the final day last year to share third place.
Regardless of the outcome tomorrow, he’s already convinced this week represents a victory.
“I think I’ve already learned so much working with Steve,” Quayle added. “I’ve learned so much just about what I’m probably looking for in a caddie. And I think also learning a bit about my own game as well and how that stacks up against some pretty good players. So look, I think you could probably call it a win irrespective. I think either way I’ve had a fun week and I think it’s something I’ll remember for a pretty long time.”
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Lee, the champion here two years ago, has the chance to build momentum for 2026 with a second Joe Kirkwood Cup.
“I’m going to be confident tomorrow,” Lee said. “I feel like I haven’t had my best stuff yet, so hopefully tomorrow can be that day. But it’s been good fun. [The] support’s been awesome and hopefully tomorrow’s a good day.
“You can go low [here],” Lee insisted. “Of course you have to have your full A game, but if you’re just a little off, it can bite you in the butt or you just can’t make birdies… No one’s broken out of the pack, but hopefully tomorrow’s the day for it.”
If neither Quayle nor Lee salute tomorrow afternoon, a Scott victory offers the next most popular result. The ageless 45-year-old is still winless in his 40s, having not raised a trophy since February 2020. The Royal Queensland member would like nothing more than to end that drought on familiar turf.
“I’m going to have to have a really good round,” said Scott, who made eight birdies in his third-round 66. “I haven’t really looked at what the conditions are, but I’m going to have to have a strong front nine like I did today to put myself in it and then maybe if I can get my name up the top of that leaderboard with seven or eight to go, but I’ll have to close well, too. I’m chasing, so I can’t have a hot front and then stall out on the back. There are too many guys up there, it’s too bunched. Someone’s going to have a good round, so it’s going to have to be a beauty tomorrow.”
Which, with this leaderboard, is exactly what’s in store.
