2023-06-06 20:54:10
Unexpectedly, the PGA Tour said on Tuesday that it had “signed an agreement which combines the commercial activities and the rights” of the powerful Saudi sovereign wealth fund (Pif) in golf, including the LIV circuit, with its own and those of the DP World Tour. “into a new, for-profit, collectively owned entity”, without the financial details being disclosed.
Launched in October 2021, the LIV has since attracted some of the best golfers in the world, former world No.1s and Grand Slam winners, from Dustin Johnson to Brooks Koepka who just won the PGA Championship, bringing a first Major to the club- house of the future dissident ex-circuit, via Phil Mickelson. “It’s a fantastic day today,” he tweeted.
The PGA Tour, supported by Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods mounted on the media front, had provided a firm response, excluding the dozens of golfers concerned, prohibiting them from participating in its tournaments, but not in the Grand Slams which are not subject to its management and have decided to leave their doors open.
Surprise among players
“After two years of disruption and distraction, this is a historic day for the sport we all love,” said PGA Tour boss Jay Monahan, who had been at the forefront of the fight once morest LIV.
“This new partnership recognizes the immeasurable strength of the PGA Tour’s history, heritage and pro-competitive model and brings it together with DP World Tour and LIV to create an instance that will benefit players, business and charitable partners and fans,” he said.
Pif boss Yasir Al-Rumayyan will chair the new entity’s board of directors, whose name has yet to be revealed, and Monahan will be its managing director.
This announcement made on Tuesday, almost a year to the day following the first LIV stamped tournament played in London, no one saw it coming, not even the players themselves. “Nothing like learning we’re merging with a circuit when we said we never would,” Canadian Mackenzie Hughes tweeted.
It comes following more than a year of litigation and legal battles launched, which will therefore end with this agreement found, which results from an economic logic. Because the PGA, which also tried to arm wrestle on the sums offered to keep its best players, facing the LIV and its record endowments of $ 25 million per event, including a guarantee on the only participation, clearly had more to lose. to defend its own interests, in the face of unlimited Saudi funds, than to enlarge them with a common entity.
“A new era”
This agreement “will usher in a new era in world golf, for the better”, promised Jay Monahan.
What, on the other hand, angers a group representing the families of the victims of the attacks of September 11, 2001, which did not fail to criticize the leader and his authority for their “hypocrisy and greed”, considering themselves “betrayed, because it appears that their concern for our loved ones was just a facade in their quest for money”.
Fifteen of the 19 hijackers on that fateful day were Saudi citizens.
“Today is a very exciting day for this sport and the people it touches around the world,” said Yasir Al-Rumayyan. “We are committed to unifying, promoting and growing the game of golf around the world and to delivering the highest quality product to millions of long-time fans, while attracting new fans.”
With LIV now sharing the same clubhouse as the PGA, it’s further evidence of Saudi Arabia’s vast winning offensive in sport, under the aegis of Crown Prince Mohamed Bin Salman.
The latest major investment to date, the Al-Ittihad club has hired football star Karim Benzema, who has just left Real Madrid, for three years, starting next season. The French Ballon d’Or will thus join Cristiano Ronaldo in the kingdom.
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