HA HA HA! I am sorry but you have to laugh out loud
In a court hearing a lawyer acting for LIV Golf accused the DP World Tour of interfering with the establishment of LIV 2.0.
This is, of course, a reference to the DP World Tour giving players a stark and entirely understandable ultimatum about the 2027 season - you either sign up to play exclusively with us or you don’t get to play with us at all.
It is utterly laughable that LIV should take the hump over this. I would remind you that this is the same organisation that came waving obscene amounts of money under players’ noses and thought nothing of the damage it may cause the game.
LIV Golf lawyer criticises DP World Tour
(Image Credit: Chris Trotman/LIV Golf)
European stars such as Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton, Sam Horsfield, David Puig and Tom McKibbin all succumbed.
It was an unsustainable model and was always doomed to fail and now it looks like the inevitable has happened.
So let me ask you a question: do you suppose for one second that when all those players were being signed up on obscene contracts that LIV gave a second’s thought to what it might all mean for the DP World Tour? Of course they didn’t!
Guy Kinnings and his team have taken absolutely the correct stance. I was never able to understand why, despite paying fines, LIV golfers were allowed to pick and choose.
Reality now bites. Brooks Koepka, Patrick Reed, Rahm, Sergio Garcia and others have all deserted the sinking ship. More will follow.
Former LIV golfers should go to Qualifying School
Joost Luiten put it quite succinctly when he said that players who left for LIV proved they "didn’t give a s***" about the DP World Tour and, therefore, shouldn’t be invited back with open arms.
Luiten told Today’s Golfer: "The DP World Tour should make it harder for guys to come back. Four years ago they didn’t give a s*** about the DP World Tour. They made a decision to go after the money. And now all of a sudden, the money is gone and they want to come back and act like nothing happened. I don’t think that’s right."
He points out that returning players would be denying places to those who have remained loyal. And that surely can’t be right.
"And why give them invites? If I apply for an invite if I’m not in a tournament, I’m not going to get it because it’s all going to the LIV guys. There’s only a certain amount of invites.
"Invites should be for young talent coming through and not guys that took the p*** against this tour and now they want to come back and they get invites. I’m not a fan of that."
Like many others, myself included, Luiten believes they should be heading to qualifying school.
As I understand it, Richard Bland is thus far the only man to commit to LIV 2.0. Forgive me, but he is highly unlikely to set pulses racing anywhere. To all intents and purposes, it’s a case of LIV RIP. You will not be missed.
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