LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil has launched a bold message towards the PGA Tour, defending his breakaway league. This comes after both Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy expressed their hopes of a long-awaited merger being finalised.
The contentious emergence of the Saudi-sponsored LIV Golf in 2022 caused notable rifts within the golfing community as top players like Phil Mickelson, Jon Rahm, and Bryson DeChambeau migrated away from the PGA.
Although a merger blueprint was settled upon in June 2023, the deal remains up in the air. Recent talks with President Donald Trump highlighted discussions over the sport’s path ahead. But whilst golf legend Woods has appeared optimistic regarding the merger’s outlook, LIV’s O’Neil threw down the gauntlet, comparing his league’s roster of stars against the PGA’s.
“The way we talk about it internally is, ‘This is now the ceiling, we want it to become the floor. How do we lift it’,” said O’Neil assertively while at LIV Golf Adelaide on Sunday. “We have some amazing cities coming up. We’re back in Mexico, but this time in Mexico City. We’re heading to [South] Korea. Those are two golf-starved markets that I think we have a chance to start to build.
“It doesn’t happen overnight, but you have a public-private partnership, corporate support. You have fans that want it. You don’t have to look too far past our leaderboard to know that, outside of the majors, if you want to see the best players in the world, there’s only one place to see it and that’s at LIV.”
The golfing world has been abuzz for nearly two years since plans for a merger involving the PGA Tour, DP World Tour, and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), which backs LIV Golf, were set in motion. On the same day O’Neil took a swipe at the PGA, Woods commended President Trump for his engagement with PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and player director Adam Scott, reports the Mirror US.
Speaking to CBS Sports, Woods said: “I think we’re in a very positive place right now. We had a meeting with the President. Unfortunately, I had some other circumstances that came up, but Jay and Adam, they did great during the meeting and we have another subsequent meeting coming up.
“I think things are going to heal quickly. We’re going to get this game going in the right direction. It’s been heading in the wrong direction for a number of years, and the fans want all of us to play together – all the top players playing together – and we’re going to make that happen.”
McIlroy, another PGA luminary, supported Woods’ sentiments: “The President, he can do a lot of things. He has direct access to Yasir [Al-Rumayyan, governor of the PIF]’s boss [Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia]. Not many people have that.
“Not many people can say, ‘I want you to get this deal done, and by the way, I’m speaking to your boss, I’m going to tell him the same thing’. He [Trump] can be influential. I saw it when I was playing with Sheikh Hamdan of Abu Dhabi [on] the day [Trump] got elected in November. I don’t think people appreciate how much respect he has [in the Middle East].”
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Publish date : 2025-02-17 11:55:00
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