Montgomerie on course for defence

Colin Montgomerie made a great start to the defence of his Irish Open title on Thursday at Fota Island, the Scot firing a four-under-par 67 to lie one shot off the pace.

Swede Joakim Haeggman, England's Nick Dougherty, Australian Peter O'Malley and veteran American Fred Funk are in the lead thanks to their respective 66's.

England's Lee Westwood, Scot Gordon Brand Jnr, Carl Pettersson and home player Des Smyth are on the same mark as Montgomerie, who started off the day with birdies on the first and third.

Further birdies on 10, 14 and 17 were blighted by a dropped shot on 13 in an otherwise tidy round from the seven-time Volvo Order of Merit champion.

Haeggman meanwhile fired five birdies, two bogeys and an eagle in his round, while Dougherty failed to capitalise on five opening birdies.

Six birdies in the first 12 holes gave O'Malley a great foundation for his sparkling effort, a dropped shot on the 16th for Funk leaving him back in the pack at the top of the leaderboard.

Brand Jnr holed out for an eagle on the first, however he failed to build on it sufficiently with a doulbe bogey on 10 keeping him at four-under.

Westwood finally will be rueing a bogey on the last, after he picked up six birdies in the first 17 holes.

Irish hopes Padraig Harrington and Darren Clarke both scored level par 71's, while English duo Ian Poulter and Justin Rose carded a 70 and 72 respectively.

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