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Cameron Smith is heading south and seemingly for the Australian Open exit gates after a lacklustre start to his second round in Melbourne.
Smith's one-over-par 71 on Thursday left the superstar world No.3 a distant eight shots off the pace entering round two and needing to make up ground to avoid the halfway chop.
But he slipped to three over for the championship after chalking up three more bogeys on his front nine at Kingston Heath on Friday.
Smith's dramatic slide down the leaderboard to a tie for 105th in the 153-player field left the British Open champion in serious danger of missing the first cut.
A four-time winner around the world in 2022, Smith has nine holes to find his mojo and drag himself back into the top 70.
His shock showing comes less than a week after winning a third straight Australian PGA Championship at Royal Queensland and arriving in Melbourne as a hot favourite to complete a prestigious summer double.
But he headed for the inward nine trailing first-round leader David Micheluzzi by 10 shots.
Even if he survives Friday's cut, Smith will need to climb in to the top 30 on Saturday to make the Open's first-ever second cut, which has been introduced to accommodate the running of the women's tournament simultaneously.
Micheluzzi has an afternoon tee time, with Frenchman Pierre Pineau reducing the Victorian's lead to two shots early on Friday.
Pineau negotiated his front nine in one under to move to five under for the tournament.
Defending champion Matt Jones, who won the last Open in 2019 before COVID-19 wiped out the 2020 and 2021 editions, was the big mover early on day two.
Jones picked up two strokes to be two under through nine holes in a share of 10th place, five behind Micheluzzi.
Adam Scott will tee off after lunch at one under.
