Just two dropped shots in two days left Zimbabwe's Marc Cayeux on top of the halfway leaderboard of the Nashua Masters being played at the par-70 Wild Coast Sun Country Club on Friday.

The defending champion backed up his opening 66 with a second consecutive four-under with five birdies and his drop coming on the par-three 11th where he three-putted. He reached halfway in 132.

He was a single shot clear of three players on seven-under 133. Scotland's David Drysdale also shot a 66, as did South Africa's Jbe' Kruger, while Darren Fichardt dropped shots on 15 and 17 to slip out of the lead down to his share of second place.

Fichardt had reached nine-under, but his putting touch deserted him on 15 and he never really got it back on the finishing stretch as he missed another sinkable effort for par on the 17th, and his chance of the lead was gone.

It was putting that was important, said Cayeux: "Putting's definitely going to be the key. Yesterday I had 32 putts and today I had 29 and I had the same score."

And the reason putting became even more important during the second round was because the wind began to come up. "With the wind today, I was obviously missing more greens in regulation than I should have," said Cayeux.

Behind the trio in second was recently-turned pro Riaan de Bruyn, who shot a two-under 68 to go with his opening 66 to reach 134 and England's Ricky Lee, who mirrored De Bruyn's scoring, and at 135 was the South African pair of Darryn Lloyd (69-66) and Alan Michell (68-67).

Cayeux noted there were a lot of players poised to challenge going into the weekend as he pondered the chances of successfully defending his title: "I'm basically not trying to think of defending it, but just play and enjoy it," he said.

He also acknowledged that the wind would play a role, and had already done so with those who got on the lucky side of the draw in the opening rounds.

"The wind is picking up and I think I got the good side of the draw -afternoon then morning. These things are supposed to even out, but they never really do on the coast," he added.

And he's not about to relinquish that title without giving it his best shot: "I'm basically hitting a lot of good wind shots, striking it well, and holing a lot of crucial putts," he said.

Sapa

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