Hannah Green rounded out her opening round of the Amundi Evian Championship with four straight birdies to climb inside the top 15 in her chase for a second women’s major championship in France last night.

Green was 2 over par for her opening round before storming home with a back nine of 31 to finish the day as the leading Australian after shooting a 3 under 68 to finish four behind Paula Reto who fired a 64 to grab a two-shot lead.

Next in line for the Australians was Minjee Lee (69) in a share of 19th place ahead of Grace Kim (71), Sarah Kemp and Karis Davidson (73) and Steph Kyriacou (74).

Green said her late charge was sparked by a good par save on the 13th where she holed a putt from just inside three metres.

“It was kind of stress free coming in which was nice,” she said.

“I knew there were going to be opportunities for birdies but you still have to do it, hit good shots.

“The course is definitely the softest in the last couple of years that we’ve played. You can be a bit more aggressive.

“You can definitely shoot some low scores but it’s quite easy to make bogeys out here.”

World number seven Minjee Lee had five birdies and three bogeys in her 2 under round