South African Hennie Otto birdied the last three holes to snare a four-stroke lead after three rounds of the Italian Open.

Otto carded a nine-under-par 63 to end the round with a 22-under-par tally on the Castello di Tolcinasco course.

The Boksburg-born Otto began the third day trailing two strokes behind Sweden's Robert Karlsson and soon found himself three adrift when Karlsson eagled the first hole with Otto managing a birdie.

But after both players bogeyed the second and Karlsson then also bogeyed the third, Otto went into lead with three birdies in succession from the third hole.

Otto then distanced himself from the seven-times European Tour-winning Karlsson with five inward birdies capped by sinking a 30-foot birdie putt at the last.

"I made a few more putts today and hit them much closer and that's why I finished a lot more under par," said Otto.

Otto has tasted success on the Southern Africa Tour but is still looking for a first European Tour victory. He will also now be out to make amends for losing in a playoff to Scotland's Alastair Forsyth in March's Madeira Islands Open.

"I am not going to be thinking about what happened in Maderia and I will just take it as another day and whoever played the best tomorrow will win," added Otto.

"I am leading by four shots so all I will be doing is playing my own game."

Karlsson set a new Milan course record with his 11-under par 61 on Friday but failed to tap into that dominating form on day three.

"I'm not really disappointed and it's just that I didn't really play very well," he said.

Joining Karlsson tied in second place on 18-under par is fellow Swede Christian Nilsson (64) and Spain's Alvaro Velasco (64).

Reuters