Anton Haig has played often at Blair Atholl and he used his intimate knowledge of the course to plot his way to a three-under-par 69 on Friday to move into a share of the lead at the halfway mark of the Sunshine Tour’s Blair Atholl Championship delivered by The Courier Guy.

While he made three bogeys in his second round, he picked up six birdies to haul in first-round co-leader Rupert Kaminski, and they shared the lead at seven-under for the tournament. They had a one-stroke lead over Heinrich Bruiners, Neil Schietekat, Luke Brown and Riekus Nortje.

“It’s a very demanding course,” said Haig. “The fairways look quite wide but they’re not and the course is so long. You need to miss in the right spots and fortunately I’ve played a lot here so I know which side to miss on. I know the back ledges and slopes better than most, which definitely helped.”

But for a putter which was a little balky, Haig could have had an even better round. “The greens were really receptive after the rain came in in the morning – fortunately for just three or four holes – and I was hitting the ball really well,” said Haig. “I had 32 putts today and 26 yesterday. So my ball-striking was really good today but my putting was a bit off.

“I’m definitely looking to score on the par fives, but you have to really knuckle two shots to get on to some of them – four of the par fives are more than 600 yards. So my length is a good advantage.”

The round of the day came from Jayden Schaper, who dropped just two shots on his way to a seven-under-par 65. He made an eagle-three on the fifth and seven birdies in his round, and climbed into a share of seventh with Kyle Barker on five-under-par, just two off the lead.