Hilversum (The Netherlands), Oct 10: Jamie Donaldson, Alastair Forsyth, Gary Murphy lead Dutch Open. Carter, struggling at 133rd on the money-list, beat seven-times European number one Colin Montgomerie in a playoff for the 1998 Irish Open title, the year he helped Nick Faldo to win the World Cup for England.
After keeping his card for nine years, Carter needs a big cheque from his last three events. Former Volvo PGA champion and six-times tour winner Tony Johnstone is an even higher profile struggler, but he gave himself an 11th-hour chance of survival with a 68 to share fourth place.
The 47-year-old Zimbabwean, who won the 2001 Qatar Masters, is in danger of losing his card after 25 years on tour, languishing 176th on the order of merit.
The European Tour revealed on Thursday that it had underwritten the Dutch Open by providing the 1 million euro prize fund, rescuing the threatened event after the main sponsors withdrew.


Leading first round scores at the 1,000,000 euros Dutch Open par-70 6,634 yards, Hilversumsche Course on Thursday (Britian unless stated): 64 Jamie Donaldson, Alastair Forsyth, Gary Murphy (Ireland) 65 David Carter, David Lynn, Fredrik Widmark (Sweden) 66 Tony Johnstone (Zimbabwe), Rolf Muntz (Netherlands), Henrik Stenson (Sweden), Steen Tinning (Denmark), Brett Rumford (Australia), Stephen Scahill (New Zealand) 67 Fredrik Andersson (Sweden), Peter Baker, John Bickerton, Nicolas Colsaerts (Belgium), Stephen Dodd, Bradley Dredge, Mark James, Maarten Lafeber (Netherlands), Jonathan Lomas, Mikael Lundberg (Sweden), Mark Pilkington, Mark Roe, Patrik Sjoland (Sweden), Joost Steenkamer (Netherlands), Miles Tunnicliffe, Nicolas Vanhootegem (Belgium), Anthony Wall, Steve Webster, Gordon Brand Jnr 68 Markus Brier (Austria), David Dixon, Gary Emerson, Pierre Fulke (Sweden), Soren Hansen (Denmark), Brad Kennedy (Australia), Malcolm MacKenzie, Andrew Marshall, Adam Mednick (Sweden), David Park, Mads Vibe-Hastrup (Denmark)


Bureau Report