Dogged Darren Clarke scraped into the last two rounds of the Murphy's Irish Open - thanks to an 18th fairway whisper from his stand-in caddie.

The Dungannon ace was level par playing the 507 yard finishing hole and needed to make a birdie to qualify bang on the cut mark for the second year in a row.

His regular caddie Billy Foster had flown back home to Manchester after his wife had given birth to their second daughter earlier yesterday.

Clarke made an emergency call to Paul McGinley's caddie, JP Fitzgerald, and he came in as a late replacement and played a blinder.

Said Clarke: "Billy had to go home today. His wife gave birth to a baby girl this morning so JP came down for me."

And his presence was to prove vital at the 18th where Clarke needed a birdie four to be sure of qualifying.

Explained Clarke: "At the last JP said, 'If you lay up and miss the cut by one you'll be as sick as a dog'.

"So I said right, I'll have a go at it. And I hit a great shot from the top of the hill. I punched in a five-iron. I had 209 to the front. I didn't know what they cut was going to be, par or one under but it was the right decision in the end."

Clarke's approach finished just a foot off the green from where he putted up to four inches for his fourth birdie of the day and a one under par 70.

The big Ulsterman trails leader Peter O'Malley by eight shots, but he is not ruling out another weekend birdie blitz and a challenge for the title.

Last year Clarke made the cut on the limit thanks to a 10-foot birdie putt on the final green. But he stormed back up the field at the weekend with rounds of 65 and 64 to tie for second behind Colin Montgomerie.

Now he's set to repeat the act with another weekend of heroics in front of the Irish fans.

He said: "Another 65-64 finish would be alright. Can I win the tournament from here? If I have as similar a weekend as last year I'll have a chance. I'll go out and play and we'll see. Hopefully a few things will happen.

"I'm actually playing okay. Nothing spectacular. I'm hitting the odd poor shot and not making anything on the greens. I had another 33 putts again today.

"So far I've had a typical Irish Open week. I've hit the ball well but I haven't been able to score. Every time I come and play and Irish Open it's like this.

"I don't know why, maybe it's because I want to win it too much. If I had missed the cut I wouldn't be talking to you but I'm pretty happy with how I finished today."

Clarke started with three pars before taking advantage of the par five fourth and fifth holes.

He two putted the fourth from 25 feet and then blasted out of a bunker to eight feet and make a 'lucky' birdie at the next.

"I misread the putt from eight feet and it went in," he joked.

He drove behind a tree and bogeyed the ninth to be out in one under before making another error at the par five 10th.

"At the ninth I thought I had made a good tee shot and it finished behind a tree. It seems I am paying the price for my poor shots. Some weeks you get away with them and some weeks you don't.

"On ten I made a mistake. I tried to get a five iron up to the height of a sand iron to get up over the trees and completely flat cold and duffed it, into the trees. It was stupid I should have just laid it up into the fairway but I was one under and trying to get a decent score going.

"I felt I had to force it to get back into the tournament and hit the wrong shot at the wrong time, tried to a five iron 200 foot up in the air."

A birdie at the 14th got him back to one under before he dropped another shot at the par three 17th.

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© Brian Keogh 2002

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