• The Tour Championship, Round Two

Donald stays in touch as red-hot Scott storms into lead

Luke Donald's short game made up for some wayward driving during round one of The Tour Championship © Getty Images

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Luke Donald produced a mature second round performance to give himself every chance of victory at the Tour Championship as Adam Scott blazed to the top of the leaderboard in Atlanta.

World No. 1 Donald, who is aiming to become the first player to top both the PGA and European Tour money lists, produced a second-round 68 to leave him two shots off the pace at East Lake Golf Club.

Donald was level-par through nine after bogeys at two and eight cancelled out birdies at the first and the seventh holes, but he began to make progress with a birdie at the tenth. A superb birdie putt at the 15th saw him move within one shot of the leaders before he showed impressive poise to chip out of a bunker to rescue a par at the 17th.

Currently third in the projected FedExCup standings, Donald is two strokes behind Scott, who leads the way at the halfway stage after a late flourish saw the Australian overhaul clubhouse leader KJ Choi. A birdie at 17 saw Scott move level with Choi, before a superb tee-shot saw him left with a simple putt for a birdie-two at the 235-yard final hole to take the outright lead.

Choi started his round with intent with a birdie at the first, and picked up another shot at three. Birdies either side of the turn helped him move up the leaderboard, and although he bogeyed the 13th, he responded with back-to-back bogeys to put himself firmly in the hunt for the big-money pay-out.

The Korean is at seven-under after 36 holes, one shot ahead of Donald and Jason Day, who was pegged back by a bogey at the 17th as he carded a second consecutive 67 to keep himself in contention at six-under.

Scott may be at the top of the pile, but the round of the day belonged to Bubba Watson, who fired seven birdies in a six-under round of 64 to move to five-under, level with Hunter Mahan, Bill Haas and overnight leader Keegan Bradley.

Phil Mickelson recovered from a slow start to give himself a faint chance of victory. Two bogeys on the front nine left the four-time major champion well off the pace, but he recovered with a pair of birdies on the back nine to sign for a level-par 70 to stay on two-under.

The other Englishman in the 30-man field at East Lake, Justin Rose, was third in the FedExCup standings following his victory at the BMW Championship last week, but his chance of back-to-back victories swiftly faded. Rose found himself in trouble after a double bogey sandwiched by two bogeys between three and five. A birdie at the eighth offered brief respite, but another double bogey at the 10th left Rose with little hope of salvaging his round as he slumped to four-over after his second-round 75 on Friday.

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