McGinley faces tense battle to make Ryder Cup team

Paul McGinley is determined to keep "chiselling away" at the points necessary to ensure a place in the European Ryder Cup team. McGinley, who holed the winning putt at The Belfry in 2002 and was unbeaten at Oakland Hills in 2004,currently occupies the final automatic qualifying place.

After this week's KLM Open, three events remain before the team is finalised: next week's USPGA Championship at Medinah, the WGC Bridgestone Invitational and the BMW International, in Munich. "You have to keep chiselling away and earning as many Ryder Cup points as you can," McGinley said after rounds of 72 and 70 left him six shots behind the clubhouse leader, Soren Kjeldsen, of Denmark midway through a second round which could not be completed yesterday after twice being interrupted by thunder. Colin Montgomerie was affected, the Scot level par for the tournament after five holes of his second round.

Sergio Garcia and David Howell are in the title hunt in America. Garcia climbed from 32nd to third at The International tournament in Colorado. Under the event's points system Garcia's four-under-par 68 converted to 10 points and took him to a half-way total of 16, two behind the early leader, Patrick Sheehan.

Howell added five points to his opening nine by going round in 70 and was in a tie for fourth place. The Swede Mathias Gronberg, the overnight leader on 13, was among the later starters, as was Justin Rose on nine.