Henrik Stenson in contention to end run of near-misses at Bay Hill

Henrik Stenson believes he’s still in the mix for Arnold Palmer Invitational victory after an impressive finish to his third round at Bay Hill.

The 39-year-old looked set to fall three shots off the pace when his approach to the 18th plugged in a greenside bunker, but he produced a superb recovery and holed from eight feet to save par and match leader Jason Day's 70.

Stenson sits on 13 under alongside Americans Troy Merritt and Kevin Chappell and feels he's in a strong position to win the title for the first time.

Speaking about saving par on the 18th, Stenson added: "That's going to make the dinner taste a little bit better and keeps us in contention obviously a bit more for tomorrow.

"It was pretty deeply plugged and I had to be very gentle and try to pop it out of the bunker and then I knew it was going to feed down to the hole and it came out just perfect.

"You can't be more aggressive because you've got water on the other side so, if anything, you've got to almost leave it in the bunker if it doesn't come out right."

Stenson has finished second, fifth and eighth in the last three years at Bay Hill and felt he had "one hand on the trophy" 12 months ago before failing to convert a two-shot lead after 54 holes.

"I don't think I did too many bad things (in the final round) last year," Stenson said. "We got put on the clock on 15 and I felt like I rushed myself on the routine and three-putted that one and that kind of threw me off my rhythm a little bit.

"Other than that, when you're in contention you've got to go out and play a solid round of golf. I played all right last year but I didn't get it finished.

"Hopefully we're in a different position now. We need to come from behind and play a really good round tomorrow if we want to have a shot at it."

Day recovered from a slow start to hold on to his overnight advantage, keeping the world No 3 on course to become the tournament's fourth wire-to-wire winner. 

The PGA Champion, searching for an eighth PGA Tour title, bounced back from an early blemish at the second to card two birdies on the front nine and also from finding the water on the 11th to pick up a shot at the 16th.

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"I'm very pleased," the US PGA champion told Sky Sports. "It was a tough old day. We had a lot of rain out there and at times it was pretty heavy.

"The wind was swirling around, it was everywhere today and the temperature changed which cost me some strokes here and there but for the most part I'm really pleased.

"On a course like this, especially today, it was very hard to make birdies. It was very easy to shoot yourself back to the field and I felt like I did a good job of staying out in front, being as patient as possible and trying to take the birdies when I could.

"I'm not sure what the weather is going to bring us tomorrow. I think it's very similar but if it is I have another day of just trying to grind it out being as patient as possible."

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