Disrupter Greg Norman is not the only one attached to LIV who will surely soon discover services are no longer requiredThe playing of a Presidents Cup, for so long the Ryder Cup’s poor relation, in Saudi Arabia now has to be on the table. The deal struck between LIV Golf and one-time rivals, the PGA and DP World Tours, is all about bang for buck.The Saudis will believe they have saved face by joining forces with golf’s establishment – there will be no more potentially embarrassing litigation – but their desperate bid to earn legitimacy via sport also means this deal has to work two ways. Continue reading...
Tour merger gives Smith everything he could possibly want while the LIV commissioner’s time as a powerbroker is surely overAs the golf world continues to reel from the news that the Saudi-backed LIV Golf will merge with the PGA Tour and the DP World tour, Australia’s Cameron Smith now has everything he could possibly desire: the money, more money to play for and his tournament of choice to play in.With Yasir al-Rumuyyan at the helm of a new world golf entity, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) take-over will have an immense impact on Australian golf and its most well known figures. Continue reading...
Life has apparently turned sour for the LIV rebel, with digs at Luke Donald, Rory McIlroy and a Ryder Cup snubThere once was a swashbuckling young Spaniard named Sergio. When Señor García burst on to the golf scene more than two decades ago, there was excitement about a player who was carefree on the course and had a twinkle in his eye off it. The expectation was that García would win a lot more than the solitary major that has come his way – the 2017 Masters – but a combined 27 victories between the DP World and PGA Tours still make the 43-year-old one of the finest players of his generation.We are, however, entitled to ask why life apparently...
LIV rebel rolled back the years with a final round flourish but futures of the two biggest names in golf are up in the airMasters week in April is always a long one in Augusta. The Monday before the major, all the talk around the course was about Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, who were out playing a practice round together. Whether it really was or not, their pairing felt like a pointed rejoinder to the LIV golfers who were still arriving at the course. Woods and McIlroy aren’t just the two biggest names in the game, but the two most outspoken critics of the breakaway tour. And here they were, taking ownership of the biggest stage.Augusta National is a...
The player who won four majors in three years was an ice-cool closer but he has not yet fully recovered from kneecap accidentIt was just gone four o’clock when Jon Rahm and Brooks Koepka made it to Juniper, Augusta’s precipitous little par-three 6th. The sun had come out, the clouds had scattered and the mercury was finally rising. Koepka had only just given up the lead he had been holding since he made a birdie to pull one shot clear on Friday morning. He and Rahm were tied in first place now, 10 under par, four shots clear of the field, and the gallery all around was waiting for Koepka to come back at him. Rahm had the honour. His...