DUBAI: This season's triple European Tour winning Matt Wallace scored an excellent bogey-free 65 at the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai on Friday to lead the season-ending tournament going into today’s third round.
The Englishman is seeking a fourth European Tour title of the season — a win that would make him the 14th player to win four times or more in a season, and the first since Alex Noren in 2016 — but faces stiff competition from the field.
Fellow Englishman Danny Willett shot a 67 to sit in second place at ten-under alongside first-round leaders Adrian Otaegui and Jordan Smith.
Meanwhile, in the battle to finish the season as Europe's No. 1, Tommy Fleetwood on eight-under needs to win in Dubai this weekend to have any chance of successfully defending his Race to Dubai title and stop the Francesco Molinari procession, and hope that Molinari finishes outside the top-five.
Wallace, though, was in confident mood.
“All aspects of my game are good at the moment,” he said.
“I feel really comfortable out there, the putter is helping me and I’m holing a lot out there. I really love this golf course and I love this tournament.
“It was massively important to me to get off to a good start, and I really had to focus in on that first putt. When you have a 25-footer on the first hole, you want to get the pace right, but I really wanted to hole it and I managed to pour it in there, and that got me going,” he added.
“It is all coming together, unfortunately at the end of the season, I do wish I had done this from the start.
“But, recently I’ve lowered my expectation levels, and that has really helped me this week. I am going to keep doing that for the rest of the weekend, and let my golf do the talking.
“That's up there with one of the best this year,” he said.
“I'm playing with freedom now and trying to place as high as I possibly can come the back nine holes on Sunday and then that's when I normally will try and kick in and want to win a tournament, depending on where I am.
“I've been in this situation before, just not in this sort of tournament. The best players are out there in the world and I just want to compete and see where my game is at against them."
Wallace also had to face being given a £3,000 ($3,860) “slow play” fine on his debut in Dubai on Thursday.
According to match referees, Wallace took too long to putt out for A par on the ninth hole, after being timed during his seventh and eighth birdie holes.
"The good thing, I guess, I paid for the fine in holing the second putt,” he said.
“Though, it was frustrating and it kind of put me out of flow for the next three to four holes.
“The thing is I don’t consider myself to be a slow player as evident in playing the three holes (7 to 9) in two-under so I saved time playing good golf.
“Hopefully, I can make up the fine by the end of this week.”
Matt Wallace gets over 'slow play' fine to lead in Dubai at DP World Tour
Matt Wallace gets over 'slow play' fine to lead in Dubai at DP World Tour
The danger is real for Tottenham as specter of Premier League relegation looms
What’s been increasingly apparent to despairing Tottenham fans for some months is now suddenly clear for everyone: their team could genuinely be relegated from the Premier League.
Spurs have been regarded for some time as part of England’s so-called “Big Six” — so much so that they were involved in the quickly aborted Super League project in 2021 — but they aren’t playing like it, at least in the Premier League.
Last season, Tottenham finished in 17th place, one spot above the bottom three, but was never in realistic danger of relegation.
This season, the danger is real. Tottenham is in 16th place but just four points above the relegation zone with 11 rounds remaining and is the only team in the league without a win in 2026 heading into a match at Fulham on Sunday.
The only victories this calendar year have come in the Champions League, which Tottenham finished in the top eight after the first stage to advance directly to the round of 16.
Spurs — the Europa League winners last season — haven’t been able to reproduce their European exploits in the Premier League, with their shortcomings exposed in a 4-1 thrashing by fierce rival Arsenal last weekend. That was Igor Tudor ‘s first match in charge of Tottenham and it laid bare the scale of the task facing the Croatian, who replaced Thomas Frank at the helm.
Tudor has a long injury list to deal with — among the top players on it are James Maddison, Dejan Kulusevski, Lucas Bergvall and Pedro Porro — as well as confidence issues within the squad. Do they have the stomach for a relegation battle?
Also going against Tottenham is the fact that third-to-last West Ham is showing more resilience in recent weeks, losing just one of its eight games in all competitions.
It doesn’t help, either, that while Spurs are at a low ebb, Arsenal is currently the top team in England.
Tottenham has been an ever-present in the Premier League since the competition was founded in 1992, and last played in the second tier in the 1977-78 season.
Key matchups
The title race resumes with first-place Arsenal at home to Chelsea. They recently met over two legs in the English League Cup semifinals and Arsenal won both games.
Manchester City is five points behind in second place, though has a game in hand, and is away to Leeds. That sees City striker Erling Haaland return to the city where he was born.
Players to watch
Manchester United striker Benjamin Sesko will be looking to score in a third straight game when Crystal Palace visits Old Trafford. Sesko scored an equalizer against West Ham and then a winner at Everton, both times off the bench.
Out of action
Liverpool manager Arne Slot will hope for positive news about Germany playmaker Florian Wirtz, who missed the win at Nottingham Forest last weekend because of back pain.
Liverpool hosts West Ham on Saturday.
Off the field
It seems Crystal Palace and its manager, Oliver Glasner, are heading toward a messy break-up.
Glasner, who led Palace to its first ever trophy last season by winning the FA Cup, has already confirmed he’s leaving his job at the end of the season and has been non-committal about whether he would even be staying that long.
Fans held up a banner containing the words, “Fans disrespected — Glasner finished” during a match against Wolverhampton last weekend.
