English pair lead way

Broadhurst, the 41-year-old former Ryder Cup player who has not had a top-10 finish all season, was in the sixth group out and made the most of the ideal early conditions by bursting out of the blocks with five birdies in the first eight holes.

Then later in the day Rose, making his first appearance since coming fifth in the Masters last month and then suffering more back trouble, grabbed eight birdies to make it a tie at the top.

Broadhurst, who narrowly missed out on a return to the European side after a 15-year gap last year, did bogey the ninth, but further birdies came on the 11th and long 17th.

They were one shot ahead of a group which included Essex's Simon Khan, runner-up to David Howell in the event last May, but perhaps still best known as the player fined a record £8,000 for slow play in Ireland two years ago.

Only two behind - and still with the par five 18th to come - was world number five Ernie Els, the man who has toughened up the West Course in the last two years and who lives alongside it.

Els actually started with a bogey after pulling his drive into the rough and he also double-bogeyed the 449-yard ninth, but his front nine also contained birdies at the second, fourth and fifth and then had five more birdies on the inward half.

The South African is a six-time winner of the World Match Play on the lay-out, but never of the European Tour's flagship event.