Johannesburg, South Africa, December 8: Matt Wallace of England has put himself in a prime position to win his second Asian Tour title this year after carding a three-under-par 68 at the South African Open hosted by the City of Joburg on Saturday.

The 28-year-old Wallace enjoyed a bogey-free front nine and displayed his resilience on the inward nine by bouncing back with birdies every single time he dropped a shot at the Randpark Golf Club.

Wallace signed for an 11-under-par 203 total to head into Sunday in tied-second and three shots behind the leader, Louis Oosthuizen of South Africa.

“That birdie on the last was the biggest putt of the week so far for me. I saw that I could potentially get into the final group with that and I said to my caddy Glen, ‘come on, let’s make one’, we’ve hardly made one all week from that sort of distance,” said Wallace, who was also in the final-group pairing at the Hero Indian Open this year and went on to win the tournament.

“But I’ll tell you what, I’ve given away so many shots this week. I guess that comes with the little bit of rustiness from being two weeks off. It’s tough out there, and I just said to Glen there ‘if we can go tomorrow and make it stress-free and give myself as many chances as possible, we’ll be right up there’.”

Major winner Oosthuizen traded six birdies against two bogeys to return to the top of the leaderboard at the R17.5 million (approx. US$1,200,000) event.​

Overnight leader Charl Schwartzel was unable to get his round going. He started with two bogeys in his first three holes and made just one birdie before ending his day with a 72. The South African joins Wallace in tied-second.

Jbe Kruger of South Africa

Tour members Adilson Da Silva of Brazil (69) and Jbe Kruger of South Africa (72) are in tied-fifth along with Asian Tour Honourary Member Ernie Els (68).

United States’ Kurt Kitayama went off the boil on Saturday as he made only one birdie and dropped four shots. The Asian Tour rookie goes into the final round in tied-13th and seven shots off the lead at the South African Open hosted by the City of Joburg.