On the 16th green Tim’s ball marker was in the line of fellow his competitor, Padraig Harrington (who is currently leading). Harrington asked him to move it, which he duly did. It was only by the time they got the 18th, when the same situation occurred again, that Clark realised that he might not have replaced the ball correctly on the 16th.

“It’s an unfortunate situation,” Clark said after the round. “What happened is that Padraig asked me to move my ball on the last hole, and it got me thinking that I may have forgotten to move it back on the 16th hole. I just had a feeling that I had not moved it back.”

So, after his round he accompanied Tour official Slugger White to the TV tent to take a second look. “He came up and he looked at it and he knew right away as well - as honest as he could possibly be,” White said. “I’m sure it’ll come back to him tenfold. That's the gentleman's game we deal with.”

“The good thing about it is that I called it on myself,” Clark said afterwards. “That sort of saved some integrity for me. That is about the only good thing that I can take out of the situation.”

Big up, Tim! It’s a horrible thing to have happen, but it really does happen to the best of us. Here’s hoping he fires a ridiculous score today.

Oh, and as for Slugger White’s comment about it “coming back to him tenfold”; how about putting a PGA Tour victory in the script?