Long leads the British Masters as Irish trio miss Belfry cut

Tournament host Danny Willett roared back into contention at the British Masters, but there will be no Irish involvement this weekend after Jonathan Caldwell, Paul Dunne and Cormac Sharvin all missed the cut at the Belfry.

Halfway leader Hurly Long is the man to catch after a 68 left the 26-year-old on nine under par and a shot ahead of Scotland's Richie Ramsay and Denmark's Thorbjorn Olesen, with another Dane, Rasmus Hojgaard, a stroke further back.

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A further shot back is former Masters champions Willett after a 65.

It was a challenging day for the Irish contingent and with the cut line falling at level-par, none of the three made a serious push towards that score.

Caldwell and Dunne both finished seven-over while Sharvin was 13-over for his two rounds.

Long, meanwhile, started his second round from the 10th with a run of nine straight pars but then birdied five of his next six holes and was two shots clear of the field until a bogey on the ninth, his final hole of the day.

Long is in his rookie season on the DP World Tour but finished third and second in back-to-back starts earlier this year and believes that experience will stand him in good stead over the weekend.

"I think that's certainly going to help me," said Long, who was born in Heidelberg to an American father (Tom, a golf professional) and a German mother.

"I've been in this situation before. I'm really looking forward to it, there's a lot of good players near the top of the leaderboard so it should be a good test and a lot of fun."

Ramsay added a bogey-free second round of 69 to his opening 67 and has dropped just one shot in the first 36 holes after benefitting from a pep talk from long-time coach and confidant, Ian Rae, on Tuesday.

"He was saying to