On Littlestone's Championship Links, Jon Baker's round threatened at first to be shared spoils. Gregg Williams opened with a par on the short 1st, one of the easiest holes on the course, to draw level with Baker atop the leaderboard for the 2020 TEG Trophy. It would be the high point of his day.

Baker simply took over. A birdie on the 9th launched a run from the 8th to the 11th in which he gained 13 Stableford points and went four holes without dropping a gross shot, including a par on the brutal 10th, the hardest hole on the course. He finished at +8 gross, the second-best gross round recorded in TEG history to date, worth 79 strokes.

The damage to the field was severe. Baker's Trophy lead swelled from one point to five. His 2020 Green Jacket lead ballooned from seven shots to fourteen. The best Stableford total of the day belonged to a man at the bottom of the Spoon race, and it changed nothing at the top. Williams's own strong contribution counted for even less. His share of the lead lasted one hole, in a round he never controlled again.

A round 100 at Littlestone did the damage. Alex Baker opened with a double bogey at the 1st. He followed it with an 8 at the par-4 2nd, one of the harder holes on the course, for a quadruple bogey. A second double bogey at the 3rd completed the set. Three holes played, eight shots gone. There was no visible panic about any of it. He was working through the card methodically, like a man clearing a house he no longer wanted.

The slide resumed shortly after: a triple bogey at the 8th, a double at the 9th and another double at the 10th. Seven more shots in three holes, the last of them on the hardest hole on the course.

The double bogey at the 9th also tipped the TEG 13 Wooden Spoon race, sending Baker from fourth to last place, three shots adrift of the next-worst finisher, and displacing John Patterson at the bottom for the first time this TEG. It was Baker's first visit to Littlestone. The round now stands as his benchmark there. He will not be chasing it.

Gregg Williams's third round at Littlestone was a study in quiet, unspectacular consistency. From the 6th he ran off four straight pars, missing no gross shots across the stretch. The run went further still: five holes from the 6th brought him 15 stableford points, until a bogey at the 10th, Littlestone's hardest hole, finally interrupted it. He found the same rhythm again from the 12th, three more pars worth nine points. The streak ended at the 15th with a double bogey on one of the course's easiest holes, the stroke index 17. The course had run out of ways to trouble him. He arranged something himself.

None of it moved him anywhere. Williams closed with 40 points and 86 gross, respectable enough, and well short of the 49 that topped the field of five. Jon Baker's lead over the field grew rather than shrank through the round. Par after par, hour after hour, Williams finished exactly where he had begun. In the pack, admired by nobody, gaining nothing.