Will legal battles dominate golf in 2026?

View From The Fairway by Derek Clements

AS MUCH as I wish it was otherwise, our sport is going to be dominated by some complicated legal issues in 2026.

Let’s start with the status of Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton, two leading LIV golfers who were given special dispensation to carry on competing on the DP World Tour while appealing against the fines and suspensions imposed upon them for joining LIV.

It was a policy that allowed both men to compete for Europe at the Ryder Cup and which opened the door for other LIV players to carry on competing on the DP World Tour.

Now the thing with an appeal is that at some point it has to be heard and we still don’t have a clue as to when that might happen. There are rumours that it may occur in April 2026 and most pundits expect those appeals to fail. That, of course, will mean that unless the rules are changed Rahm and Hatton have played in their final Ryder Cup match.

The PGA Tour’s rules are clear. If you play on the LIV Tour then you cannot play on the PGA Tour. It is simple. But they also made it clear that if any LIV golfer was good enough then they would be considered for Ryder Cup selection.

To my way of thinking, it seems utterly outrageous that the likes of Rahm, Hatton, Patrick Reed, Cameron Smith, Abraham Ancer, Branden Grace, Louis Oosthuizen et al seem to be able to pick and choose the DP World Tour events in which they can play.

Image Credit: KD Photography

Astonishingly, Dustin Johnson is competing in the Dubai Desert Classic in January. Why? Quite apart from anything else, his form has dropped off a cliff so he is hardly a golfer you would describe as being a star draw. And he is a LIV golfer. Oh, and Hatton will, of course, be defending his title.

And to that list can now be added the name of Laurie Canter. You may recall that Canter was one of the earliest LIV recruits but was cast aside after failing to make the grade. With nowhere to go, he sought and was granted a return to the DP World Tour for the 2024 season. He managed to record a victory and repeated the feat in 2025, ending the season in seventh place in the Race to Dubai. It meant that he earned a coveted PGA Tour card. Unbelievably, he chose to spurn that golden ticket and has instead opted to go back to LIV.

For me, it is a move that beggars belief. For Canter, it is all about his bank balance. He claims that he was made an offer that was too good to refuse.

It should come as no great surprise that Canter’s latest U-turn has divided opinion within the world of golf. And that includes one of his closest friends within the sport, Eddie Pepperell, a man who has been to hell and back with his game but worked his socks off to get back onto the DP World Tour for the 2026 season.

The pair clashed on The Chipping Forecast podcast, with Pepperell making it clear that he believes there should be no place on the DP World Tour for LIV golfers.

This was Canter’s take: “Ultimately, without being crude about it, I got a really great offer – great opportunity to go. So when you look at that, and as I see it, hopefully the ability to keep playing the tournaments in Europe that I kind of resonate with, that was the big part of the decision-making process.

“I think it would be in the DP World Tour’s interest to get the best fields they could possibly get. Whether I was a member or not, Rory McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood, Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton – those are the guys that put bums on seats. Bryson DeChambeau… Dustin Johnson playing the Dubai Desert Classic… I’m in that camp. To have the best people playing, that benefits everyone.

“I think a great result for the DP World Tour, if we’re talking about LIV, would be to potentially not just have Jon Rahm come and play a couple of events where he can play, it would be to have Jon Rahm fight Rory McIlroy for the Race to Dubai”

Pepperell’s response was one that will resonate with many, myself included. He said: “If you go to LIV and take the money, you can still, somehow, at the moment, have access to play in the DP World Tour, but it doesn’t seem to work the other way. So there’s a bit of an imbalance about things at the moment.

“Until there is access that is even remotely equivalent between tours, the DP World Tour cannot afford to just open their doors up to LIV players. Fundamentally, it can’t, because there’s an injustice inherent within that. And I’m not talking about the Jon Rahms and the Bryson DeChambeaus – I’m talking about the Brendan Steeles, the Cameron Tringales, the Kevin Nas. The people who offer little to no value to any field in which they play, with all due respect. You cannot have a situation where the DP World Tour is just opening their doors up to LIV golfers while the same isn’t happening in the other direction.”

There is a wider issue at play here. For every LIV golfer who takes a place in a DP World Tour field it means that a genuine lower-ranked tour player is denied a place in that tournament. Pepperell is exactly the sort of player who would be impacted by LIV’s stars playing in Europe.

I don’t know about you, but all of this leaves a seriously bad taste in my mouth.

This is my final View from the Fairway of 2025 - I would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous New Year. Happy golfing to you all!