Bob MacIntyre surges into contention at Players Championship after best ever round at Sawgrass

The Scot carded a superb seven-under-par 65, which included nine birdies, on day three of the tournament to surge from a share of 42nd place into the top 10 after back-to-back level par rounds of 72 in the opening two rounds.

MacIntyre rolled in three birdies in succession from the 15th before concluding with a nerveless 10-foot par putt and was sitting as high as sixth place when leader Ludvig Aberg started his third round.

Elsewhere, Rory McIlroy continued to struggle as his slim hopes of a Players Championship defence slipped away after a scrappy level-par round left him in the bottom half of the field.

Two of his three bogeys came after finding water off the ninth and 12th tees, the second cutting short his momentum after successive birdies threatened to kickstart his back nine.

Still on their front nine, Justin Rose, Matt Fitzpatrick, Viktor Hovland, Sepp Straka and Tommy Fleetwood were all inside the top 14.

World number one Scottie Scheffler shrugged off his struggles of the first two days with a bogey-free, five-under 67 to lift him to four under for the tournament.

He rejected the suggestion that the work he had been doing on the range had produced a fix for his erratic driving.

“Did I find anything? I think that would imply that I was lost, which is not the case,” he said.

Spectators were delayed from entering the course in the morning “for operational reasons” after two people were shot and killed on Friday night less than a mile from the tournament’s main parking area and the suspect entered PGA property where he encountered tournament employees during his attempted escape.