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Two-times defending champion Cameron Smith has battled while Adam Scott is prepared to strike after day one of the Australian PGA Championship.
Adam Scott is ready to "rip the front nine apart" on Friday after holing clutch putts to stay in touch on day one of the Australian PGA Championship.
Two-times defending champion Cameron Smith (74) struggled, but Scott (70) sits just three shots behind early pace-setters Lucas Herbert and Brett Rankin, who opened with five-under rounds of 67 in placid morning conditions at Royal Pines on the Gold Coast.
A flat Smith - aiming to become the first man in more than 100 years to win the tournament in three consecutive years - battled all day to finish two-over and in danger of missing the cut.
But a long-range eagle putt and a longer birdie putt ensured Scott - the 2013 champion and marquee man - remained in the hunt for his first tournament win since February 2016.
Like Smith, Scott also threw in a double bogey when he found the water off the tee on the 13th hole.
But he made two long putts, for birdie and eagle, either side of that and had earlier left another long birdie putt dangling on the lip of the cup.
The 2013 Masters champion arrived on the Gold Coast frustrated that his consistency hadn't been rewarded with a title for almost four years.
Twice this year he finished runners-up.
But his Thursday efforts gave him confidence that title drought could be remedied by Sunday afternoon.
"I'm putting good ... I'm playing good; unfortunately I really mis-hit that drive off 13 and it cost me two (shots)," Scott said.
"Other than that it was pretty much stress free; I was very happy with it because it wasn't very easy out there.
"Not playing well, you could be over par quite easily and leave yourself with a lot of work to do, but it leaves me in a great spot with hopefully light winds tomorrow morning to come out and rip the front nine apart."
Scott's playing partners Min Woo Lee (68) and former British Open champion Stewart Cink (70) also managed the trickier afternoon conditions well, but couldn't quite match Herbert and Rankin's efforts earlier in the day.
That leading pair finished seven shots clear of Smith, who admitted he lacked energy after an emotional Presidents Cup campaign in Melbourne last week.
The Brisbane product was even at the turn but the wheels fell off in a three-hole stretch that included a double bogey and two bogeys.
Smith overshot the green on the par three second hole and then needed two chips before missing the bogey putt.
The defending champion then hit a tree with his second shot on the next hole but managed to find two birdies on the way home to give himself a fighting chance of featuring on the weekend.
"It's always hard coming off the back of something emotionally charged like last week," Scott said.
"There were times out there just reminding myself to really focus in and play hard ... because some soft golf wouldn't have been good this afternoon."
