David Mullin tightened his grip on the Green Jacket at Costa Brava. He closed round two with three straight pars from 15 to 17. The stretch cost him nothing in gross terms and gained three shots to par on his handicap line. Tidy, unhurried, and faintly insulting to everyone else on the property. His Jacket lead went from one shot to five. Gregg Williams, elsewhere, held the top of the Trophy standings with the gap there unchanged at nine.

At the other end of the table, the Wooden Spoon changed hands. Stuart Neumann bogeyed the par-4 12th, one of the harder holes on the course, and that was sufficient to deposit him at the very bottom, displacing Henry Meller. The margin is thin. Just one shot back to the next player. Neumann could climb straight out of the cellar in round three. For Mullin, the direction of travel looks rather more settled.

Gregg Williams arrived at Club de Golf Costa Brava on 22 September 2013 leading the TEG Trophy. An opening round of net -12 had earned him the privilege. Round 2 examined the claim in some detail.

The front nine was a procession of bogeys, interrupted only by a quadruple bogey at the 7th, the hardest hole on the course. By the turn he was leaking shots in every direction. He continued, throughout, to carry himself like the leader of a golf tournament.

The stretch from the 9th to the 12th read rather better than it looked. Four more bogeys, but with handicap strokes attached they banked him four shots against the field. The relief lasted exactly four holes. From the 13th to the 16th he shed 11 gross shots without recording a single net par. That was the low point of the round, and it was not a close contest.

A birdie at the 17th, the easiest hole, finally broke the run of bogey-or-worse. The swing from Round 1 to Round 2 was 12 shots. His overnight cushion absorbed all of it without complaint. He still led the Trophy, the gap unchanged at nine.