Colin Montgomerie broke one record and equalled another as he began the defence of his Cisco World Match Play title with a sparkling victory over Ryder Cup teammate Padraig Harrington at Wentworth.

Montgomerie, winner of the last three Volvo PGA championships on the course as well, had an eagle and nine birdies in a morning 61 which lowered the tournament record by one.

Eleven under par at lunch, the 37-year-old Scot then had another five birdies and one bogey as he crushed Harrington for the second year running, this time by five and three.

The Dubliner was hammered 7 and 6 at the semi-final stage 12 months ago. Only two under par for those 30 holes, he improved nine strokes on that yesterday, but it was still not enough.

When the cracking quarter-final contest ended he was 15 under, which matched Sandy Lyle's tournament best performance against Tommy Nakajima 14 years ago.

Montgomerie's 61 was not a course record, however, as preferred lies were in operation and he did not have to hole out on every green, but it will still go down as one of the great rounds on one of Britain's best known tests.

He has had only one other competitive 61 in his career, but that was on the far easier and par 71 Crans-sur-Sierre in the Swiss Alps four years ago. The West Course is 7,047 yards and playing as long as it ever has after heavy recent rain.

Montgomerie today faces Masters champion and 1997 winner Vijay Singh for a place in the final.

The tall Fijian had a 5 and 4 triumph over Ulsterman Darren Clarke, whose day began with a 40th hole victory over Nick Faldo in a first round marathon stretching into a second day.

In the other half Lee Westwood, playing just as well as Montgomerie, was three-up on Sergio Garcia with seven to go and world No 2 Ernie Els led fellow South African Retief Goosen by three with eight holes remaining.

Westwood, current favourite to end Montgomerie's seven-year reign as European No 1, is looking forward to trying to repeat his 1998 quarter-final victory over Els.

''I want to play whoever's playing best,'' he said.

''I prefer that. The pressure is on and you want to test yourself all the time. Today I did and I was good enough.''

Els was nine under par and five up with 11 to play, but still had a few nervous moments.

By the time Goosen eagled the long 30th the gap was down to two. He then hit his tee shot to three feet two holes later, but Els followed him to four feet, holed and Goosen missed.

''It could have gone the other way easily,'' said Els. ''I'm just happy to get through to play Lee, who's one of the hottest players in the world this year.''

l Europe resisted a brave American fightback to claim a three-point lead after the first day of the Solheim Cup at Loch Lomond.

Dale Reid's side had created history with a first-ever whitewash in the morning foursomes and a commanding 4-0 lead in the biennial event.

But for much of the afternoon that hard-earned advantage appeared to be slipping away as Pat Bradley's side threatened to close the gap to just half a point.

Laura Davies and Alison Nicholas were thrashed 6 and 5 in the first match of the afternoon to set the tone and although Trish Johnson and Sophie Gustafson earned a half, Swedish pair Helen Alfredsson and Liselotte Neumann, the only change from the morning, lost to Kelly Robbins and Pat Hurst.

Scot Janice Moodie and Annika Sorenstam then sealed two more points and Europe ended the day with 51/2 points, the US 21/2