Fitzpatrick leads through two shots at WGC event in Memphis

Fitzpatrick finished second at the Arnold Palmer Invitational in March WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational, second round leaderboard-9 M Fitzpatrick (Eng); -7 P Cantlay (USA), C Smith (Aus), J Rahm (Spa), B Horschel (USA); -6 S Imahira (Jpn); -5 A Norwegians (Swe), W Simpson (USA), I Poulter (Eng), J Rose (Eng), B Koepka (USA), B Watson (USA) Selected others: -4 R McIlroy (NI); -3 T. Hatton (Eng); -2 T Fleetwood (Eng); -1 M Wallace (Eng); Level S Garcia (Spa), J Spieth (USA); +1 D Willett (Eng)

Matthew Fitzpatrick of England shot a six-under-par 64 to take a two-shot lead in the middle of the WGC-FedEx St Jude Invitational in Memphis.

Fitzpatrick, who started the round five shots behind the leader of the night Jon Rahm, mapped seven birdies and a bogey to go down to nine for the tournament. .

World number one Brooks Koepka is next to England Justin Rose and Ian Poulter in fifth place at TPC Southwind.

Rory McIlroy from Northern Ireland, who missed the cut at The Open in Portrush, is a shot farther back at four under after his 67.

Fitzpatrick, who said "the golf course fits probably more with me than most ", his first four holes birled while recording his lowest lap in a PGA Tour event.

A win would qualify him for the season-dependent FedEx Cup play-off of the PGA Tour in August.

"I was looking forward to some free time. But if I made the play-offs, that would clearly be brilliant," added the Yorkshireman, who is the European Tour winner five times.

"The goal at the start of the season was to get my [PGA Tour] card and of course I packed it early, so anything extra is a bonus."