GOLF: For a wee time in the desert heat yesterday, it all seemed a little mad. Darren Clarke, who likes to make a fashion statement by wearing black, even on the hottest of days, started the second round of the Dubai Desert Classic like a man possessed.

He ran off three successive birdies from the first, and it must have seemed like a throw of the gauntlet to his playing partner Ernie Els.

By the day's end, however, it was Els - the world number two - who had gently tiptoed his way farther away from Clarke's clutches. As the birdies dried up for Clarke, and a couple of errors crept in, the air of invincibility that has surrounded the South African of late returned. And Els, already a four-time winner around the world this year, moved menacingly into a four-way share of the midway lead on 10-under-par 134.

For Clarke, though, there remains much to play for. And, at five shots adrift of the leaders after adding a second round 69 to his opening 70, the big, cigar-smoking Ulsterman is still very much within striking distance.

"I've got it down to a very fine art of taking as many shots as I can on the course," said Clarke of a day's work in which his ball-striking was generally superior to that of Els, but where the business end of actually getting the ball into the hole let him down.

So, for over an hour after finishing his round, and as dusk descended, Clarke could be seen on the putting green in front of the clubhouse that is shaped like a Bedouin tent. From there, he had an appointment with a local doctor, hoping to cure the fluid in his ear which has troubled him for the best part of three weeks and which has stubbornly refused to go away.

"It's affecting his balance, not so much that he is in danger of falling over, but it is a nuisance," explained his manager, Chubby Chandler.

Indeed, it seemed that the Irish contingent would require its own medical tent. Paul McGinley played yesterday with a chest infection. "I'm all bunged up and my energy levels are very low," he said, before heading off to bed rather than the practice ground.

Still, McGinley managed to shoot a 69 for three-under 141.

Padraig Harrington, who fulfilled a 6.15 a.m. appointment with the physio for treatment on his neck injury prior to his round, made the cut on the mark, shooting a 70 for one-under 143.

"I'm struggling with my focus and concentration," explained Harrington. "I'm getting distracted by little things and am uncomfortable in my stance, which is too wide. It's typical of what happens to me in the early part of the season."

For the other Irish players, there were mixed fortunes. Peter Lawrie, who had missed the cut in his last four tournaments, fired a 69 to finish on three-under 141. On the bubble of one-under going into the tougher front nine, which yesterday played as his back nine, having started on the 10th, Lawrie gave himself a huge cushion with an eagle on the third. A decision to switch from the softer blue Callaway ball to the harder red gave him some much-needed extra yardage, and he hit a three-iron apporach shot of 230 yards to 15 feet and sank the putt that was to go a long way towards ending his miserable sequence of missed cuts.

However, Gary Murphy, who needed to hole a 25-foot eagle putt on the last to make the cut, only for it to slide agonisingly by, and Graeme McDowell both failed to survive into the weekend.

For much of yesterday, it was hard to decipher between Els and Clarke as to who was number two in the world.

Clarke appears to have fully discovered what direction his game is going, and he played quite lovely golf. He started with three straight birdies, but it could easily have been seven as he had further birdie putts on the next four holes, three of which slid by the hole and another which settled on the jaw but refused to fall.

On the way home, though, Clarke "paid the penalty" for some loose play. He bogeyed the 12th, where he drove into the right wasteland and could only move his ball from beside a bush across the fairway to more desert sand, and he three-putted the 15th for another bogey.

He also failed to birdie the last, a par five, despite being on the back of the green in two. Rather than dark clouds descending, however, Clarke - who has scheduled a two-day session with sports psychologist Bob Rotella in Florida in two weeks - accepted full responsibility. "It's all down to me," he said.

It would seem that playing beside Els for two days has had a soothing influence on Clarke. But it is Els who has manoeuvred his way into a real position of contention. In fact, he would have held the midway lead all on his own but for a bogey on the last - his only one in two rounds of golf - when he attempted to carry the water from the right rough only to fly into the middle of the pond.

Els shares the lead with Alastair Forsyth, Mikko Ilonen and David Lynn.