Luke Donald and Jim Furyk share lead in bid to land £7.2m Tour jackpot

Jim Furyk, the man who began the FedEx Cup play-offs by oversleeping and being disqualified, now looms as the biggest threat to Luke Donald's hopes of a £7.2 million jackpot this weekend.

While Paul Casey fell back badly late in the second round of the Tour Championship in Atlanta, playing partner Furyk produced a brilliant best-of-the-day 65 to reach halfway on eight under par. But Donald, with his short game razor-sharp, matched that aggregate with a second successive 66 and they are a stroke ahead of Australian Geoff Ogilvy.

Casey, with a definite point to prove after Donald received a Ryder Cup wildcard and he missed out, finished with three bogeys and from joint overnight leader now has five strokes to make up.

Furyk, who at Celtic Manor next week will collect his seventh cap, was thrown out of the first of the four play-off events for missing his tee-off time - not in the tournament itself, but the curtain-raising pro-am.

That rule was subsequently changed, but Furyk returned the following week and by winning tomorrow may well pocket the near 6.4 million FedEx bonus as well as the 860,000 first prize.

He chipped in on the first hole - playing partner Casey also birdied it - and after turning in 33 to be two behind Donald he overtook him by picking up more shots at the 11th, 14th and 15th with a putter he bought recently for under 20.

But Donald matched the birdie on the long 15th, then made a 30-footer at the next and got out of trouble at the two closing holes.

Casey was left wishing he could have done the same. He was in no fewer than six bunkers on the last four holes and slipped to fifth place.

Scot Martin Laird, joint last after an opening 75, was bringing up the rear on his own when he added a 73. It was shaping up to be worse than that, though, when he went in the lake for the second day running on the short sixth and found more water en route to another double bogey at the long ninth.

But Laird, who lost a play-off to Matt Kuchar in the first FedEx Cup event, came home in a one-under 34.

"It's early days," said Donald after his opening round. "Anything can happen - but it's nice to position yourself well."

Casey, making his debut in the event, said of his opening effort: "I'm very happy with that. This is a course which, if you play a couple under par every day, you are going to put yourself in a wonderful position."

Mickelson admitted he was using the event to fine tune his game ahead of the Ryder Cup. He said: "I think everybody on the team is using this as a way of keeping their game sharp in addition to trying to win the biggest prize on our Tour."

Meanwhile, Rory McIlroy warmed up for the Ryder Cup with his seventh hole-in-one at Royal Portrush yesterday. McIlroy started the back nine with back-to-back eagles, but he and his father were still beaten by cup vice-captain Darren Clarke and former Tour player Stuart Cage, who now works for the 21-year-old's management company.