A pair of eagles rocketed Wentworth specialist Paul Casey into a two-stroke lead after the PGA Championship second round on Friday. The 31-year-old Briton, who scooped a first prize of $1.58 million when he landed the 2006 World Match Play title on the same leafy West Course, fired a five-under-par 67 for an eight-under total of 136. With a fresh breeze and tight pin-placements making scoring tough, Casey was two ahead of holder Miguel Angel Jimenez of Spain (70), Dane Soren Kjeldsen (69) and British trio Anthony Wall (71), David Horsey (71) and Marc Warren (66). The first of Casey's eagles came at the par-five fourth when he punched a seven-iron to seven feet and sank his putt. US Masters winner Angel Cabrera and world number four Henrik Stenson led a procession of high-profile players to miss the cut. Argentine Cabrera, who won this event in 2005, slumped to a 75 for 149 while Stenson (70), winner of the Players Championship in Florida this month, finished on 148. Among the other casualties were twice major winner Retief Goosen of South Africa, Oliver Wilson of Britain and former European number one Lee Westwood. Padraig Harrington and Ian Poulter skipped the European Tour's flagship event for the second year in a row and Westwood, who carded two 77s, joked he was tempted to join them. Nitties, Duke share lead Australian rookie James Nitties birdied the final four holes to match American Ken Duke for the lead Thursday after the opening round of the $6.5 million US PGA Byron Nelson Championship. Each man fired a five-under par 65 in the opening round, with Nitties taking a bogey par-4 fourth hole, recovering with birdies at the par-3 fifth and par-5 seventh before his impressive closing run to the top of the leaderboard. Duke birdied the fourth but took a bogey at the next hole then ran off three birdies in a row starting at the ninth and finished with birdies at the par-3 13th and par-5 16th holes for only his second share of a first-round lead. Nitties, 26, was second in last year's PGA Tour qualifying tournament and after putting his approach at the par-5 15th five feet from the pin, made no putt longer than 12 feet from there to the finish. Sharing third on 66 were Canadian Mike Weir and Americans Brad Adamonis, Scott McCarron and Charles Howell. Icher, Park share lead In New York, France's Karine Icher and South Korean Hee Young Park each fired an eight-under par 64 on Thursday to share the lead after the opening round of the $1.5 million LPGA Corning Classic. Icher, playing in the last group, sank an eight-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole to share the top spot with Park, who dropped a six-foot birdie at the 18th and had only one of eight birdies in a bogey-free round from beyond 10 feet. Sharing third on 65 were Finland's Minea Blomqvist, Germany's Sandra Gal and Koreans Hee-Won Han, Soo
