Jason Day's quest to be a dominant world No.1 remains on track after he demoralised Jordan Spieth at the Players Championship.
Day set a tournament 36-hole scoring record of 15 under at TPC Sawgrass while world No.2 Spieth lagged 14 shots behind, missing the cut by a stroke in his first appearance since his Masters meltdown.
Playing in the same group proved tough for Spieth as the American had no answer for Day's firepower and touch on the greens, contributing to a poor attitude.
"I just think that I'm beating myself up a little bit too much on the golf course and it's affecting me and I realise that now," Spieth said.
"I just need to be a little bit more positive with myself on the course and maybe kind of lower expectations a little bit and just kind of free myself up.
"It just seems I'm so tense and I just need to get back to the way I enjoy playing golf and I'm not far off."
When pressed on whether Day's ruthless play was a factor Spieth admitted as much.
"It's tough when you're getting shellacked by 15 shots in the same group," he said.
"When someone's birdieing almost every single hole, every other hole, you start to wonder why in the world you aren't making any of them.
"A lot of times it's good to play with, if you can feed off of it. But for me it was tough this week, without my putting being on, it just led to a lack of patience for me seeing every hole being birdied and not being able to do much about it."
The quotes were music to Day's ears.
The 28-year-old Australian is trying to create an aura akin to the one Tiger Woods dominated with for some time.
Should he turn his four-stroke 54-hole lead into a win on Sunday (Monday AEST) it will be the seventh in his last 17 starts, and fifth straight when leading into the final round.
He will also open up a lead of almost 2.5 average points over Spieth at the top of the world rankings, a significant gap.
"I hope he talks like that for the rest of his life; it would be nice," Day said.
"It just goes to show what he thinks about my game, and gives me a lot of confidence going forward knowing that he thinks about that, in that way, and that I'm doing the right things on the golf course to make him feel that way.
"Obviously we're all out there trying to beat each other up, but after the round we're happy for each other whether we win or lose."
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