LOCH LOMOND (Scotland) - AUSTRALIAN left-hander Richard Green claimed the early first-round lead at the Scottish Open with a superb 64 that he rated good enough to put him among the best 20 golfers on the planet.

Green arrived at Loch Lomond with a bit of form under his best after top ten finishes in his previous two outings. But he revealed that his display in Wednesday's pro-Am had been so off-key it had sent him heading for the practice ground in despair on the eve of the tournament.

Something clicked and the result was six birdies and an eagle in a round that left him a shot ahead of England's Graeme Storm, Spain's Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano and US-based Scot Martin Laird.

'Not a lot went wrong,' Green admitted. 'I hit it excellent tee to green and made some putts.'

The highlight of his round came on the long 13th hole, where a drive and 250-yard 3 wood put him in position to hole a sharply breaking eagle putt from 35 feet.

Green broke into the top 30 in the world in 2007 but has slipped down the rankings since then having, by his own admission, allowed three or four winning positions to slip through his fingers.

He currently stands 90th and admitted: 'I had a lot of time off at the start of the year and that is not going to help your ranking. But I'm heading in the right direction again now. I spent three or four years around the top 50 and I am just trying to get myself back to that position. Hopefully the way I am playing now is good enough to be top 20. There have been a lot of opportunities for me where I've not handled the pressure as well as I would have liked to but the more I put myself there, the more I feel I can do it.'

Storm attributed his form to a fitness regime that was triggered by being told he was too fat.

'I went for an assessment and some of the results were not very nice,' he recalled. 'I had a scan for body fat. I'm not going to tell you what the result was but it was not very good! 'Then obviously you look at the world number one (Tiger Woods) and he is the fittest guy around.'

Storm, who won the French Open two years ago but has not fully delivered on the promise he showed as Britain's leading amateur a decade ago, had been aware for some time that his lack of fitness was undermining his chances of success. -- AFP