Shigeki Maruyama carded a three-under-par 68 on Saturday to remain in contention for a first win on the Japan Tour in a decade.

He holds a share of the lead heading into the final round of The Championship by Lexus.

The 40-year-old shot four birdies against one bogey to join South Korea's Kim Kyung-tae at the top of the leaderboard on 11 under, 202.

Maruyama's last win in Japan came at the Bridgestone Open in 1999.

Kim returned to the clubhouse having carded five birdies against three bogeys for a 69 while Toshinori Muto (71) and Australian Wayne Perske (69) are tied third on nine under.

Collated third round scores & totals in the Japan Tour The Championship by LEXUS, Otone Country Club, Bando, Ibaraki, Japan

(Jpn unless stated, par 71)

202 Shigeki Maruyama 66 68 68, Kyung-Tae Kim (Kor) 66 67 69

204 Wayne Perske 66 69 69, Toshinori Muto 68 65 71

207 Nobuhiro Masuda 71 69 67, Hideto Tanihara 73 67 67, Makoto Inoue 71 69 67, Katsunori Kuwabara 67 71 69

208 Toru Suzuki 71 70 67, Toyokazu Fujishima 69 71 68, David Smail (Nzl) 68 69 71, Kazuhiro Yamashita 67 68 73, Hyung-Sung Kim (Kor) 66 69 73

209 Shintaro Kai 69 71 69

210 Tetsuya Haraguchi 68 74 68, Azuma Yano 70 67 73

211 Tadahiro Takayama 71 71 69, Hiroyuki Fujita 71 72 68, Steven Jeffress (Aus) 72 68 71, Yusaku Miyazato 71 68 72, Naoya Takemoto 69 69 73

212 Eddie Lee (Nzl) 72 70 70, Achi Sato 71 72 69, Satoru Hirota 69 72 71, Hidemichi Tanaka 70 71 71, Hyung-Tae Kim (Kor) 67 73 72

213 Brandt Jobe (USA) 72 70 71, Masaya Tomida 67 75 71, Toru Taniguchi 71 72 70, Takeshi Kajikawa 75 69 69, Norio Shinozaki 74 70 69, Hirofumi Miyase 69 76 68, Ryuichi Oda 70 68 75, Toshimitsu Izawa 69 68 76

214 I J Jang (Kor) 70 72 72, Kaname Yokoo 70 72 72, Akio Sadakata 71 70 73, Yui Ueda 69 75 70, Steven Conran (Aus) 73 71 70, Gregory Meyer 72 73 69

215 Chawalit Plaphol (Tha) 74 68 73, Sushi Ishigaki 72 70 73, Kazuhiko Hosokawa 73 70 72, Kiyoshi Murota 71 72 72, Yuji Igarashi 73 69 73, Takashi Kanemoto 68 73 74, Dinesh Chand 72 72 71, Jun Kikuchi 73 72 70

216 Mamo Osanai 71 72 73, Michio Matsumura 72 72 72, Tetsuji Hiratsuka 70 74 72, Kouki Idoki 73 72 71, Tatsunori Nukaga 72 73 71, Masahiro Kuramoto 71 74 71

217 S K Ho (kor) 70 72 75, Katsumasa Miyamoto 70 70 77, Taichi Teshima 72 73 72

218 Kunihiro Kamii 73 70 75

219 Craig Parry (USA) 75 68 76, Taigen Tsumagari 73 70 76

220 Kiyoshi Miyazato 71 71 78