This week’s roundup also features rowdy homecoming parades, Retrospective Punishment and more teammates tussling1) There will be no action at the Crucible this month, with the World Snooker Championship scheduled to take place at an unspecified date later this year. Judd Trump will have to wait to defend the title he won in 2019, beating four-time champion John Higgins. It’s 35 years since that final frame between Dennis Taylor and Steve Davis (10 since a rematch). And 30 since Stephen Hendry won the first title of seven by beating Jimmy White in 1990. He won his fifth by beating Nigel Bond in 1995. Twenty years ago, it was Mark Williams claiming his first title, beating a Welsh compatriot Matthew Stevens....
Rory McIlroy and Brooks Koepka are among those to distance themselves from the new tour, but too much time and money has been invested for PGL to turn back nowCoronavirus and its associated troubles is not the only matter to have caused Jay Monahan recent strain. As golf, like all other sports, now seeks to navigate a path towards resumption there will inevitably be a sense that additional challenges may disappear. They may actually multiply. Monahan, in his role as the PGA Tour’s commissioner, encountered 2020 turmoil even before the pandemic afforded the world a new normal.The Premier Golf League dominated discussion in the early part of this year, even though sceptics insist this is a scheme based in dreamland....
Game is in unique position to lay down a marker in a sporting world which will be reshaped after fighting Covid-19The release of a revised majors schedule arrived like a beacon of light. One isn’t scraping barrels of insensitivity to point out that thoughts of the return of sport, not just exclusively at its elite level, get many people smiling during these grim and uncertain times. Disappointment that there will be no Open Championship in 2020 was offset by the thought of a US PGA Championship in August, a September US Open, the Ryder Cup going ahead as scheduled and an utterly novel November Masters. Related: Golf's hiatus offers reminder of what the Open was before money talked | Ewan...
Wonderful reruns being broadcast of past Opens stirs memories of a time when venues were not favoured on the basis of how many spectators they held. Less can be moreCrunch time should not be far away for the Open. The Royal St George’s event is one of precious few remaining on Britain’s traditional summer sporting schedule. Should it fall victim to coronavirus – and the chances are strong – the R&A will face a multi-layered problem: next year’s Open is already earmarked for St Andrews, marking the 150th staging of golf’s oldest major. Related: Ryder Cup could be a battle between a dozen captain's picks apiece | Ewan Murray Continue reading...
If golf gets going again in time for Whistling Straits but too late for a meaningful qualification period, it could all come down to those Padraig Harrington and Steve Stricker take a shine toTommy Fleetwood, John Rahm, Rory McIlroy, Victor Perez, Tyrrell Hatton, Danny Willett, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Lee Westwood and Bernd Wiesberger. Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson, Patrick Reed, Gary Woodland, Xander Schauffele, Webb Simpson, Justin Thomas and Tiger Woods. If Ryder Cup automatic qualifying was settled today, those 17 individuals would be guaranteed a berth at Whistling Straits.It hardly represents a B-list of transatlantic golf – the United States, in theory, would be the stronger – but there are notable absentees. Fundamentally, of course, nothing at all should be decided...