Luke Donald is on course to retain his BMW PGA Championship title - and to return to world number one - after a nightmare day for overnight leader James Morrison at Wentworth.
Four clear after a sparkling second round 64, the world number 236 crashed to an 81 and will go into the closing 18 holes eight strokes behind.
While local man Morrison had a quadruple bogey, a triple bogey and three single bogeys on his card, Donald showed his class with a 69 - the joint best round of the day in the windy conditions.
Needing only a top-eight finish to take the number one spot back off Rory McIlroy, the 34-year-old is now 11 under par and two ahead of Justin Rose.
Donald is trying to follow Nick Faldo (1980 & 1981) and Colin Montgomerie (1998 to 2000) as the only players to make a successful defence of the European Tour's flagship event.
After an impressive outward nine, Ireland's Peter Lawrie held the lead midway through his round but he dropped three shots in the last six holes to slip back to level par for the day, seven under for the tournament and now four shots off the lead in third place.
David Higgins shot a third-round 74 to drop back to two under for the tournament but he's just outside the top ten, in a share of 13th spot.
