Tiger Woods has hit out at Greg Norman and LIV Golf, declaring the Australian icon was “not acting in the best interests of the game” and that LIV recruits had “turned their back” on the major tours.
Woods made his most in-depth remarks on the Saudi Arabia-financed LIV Golf during a Tuesday press conference at the 150th Open Championship at St Andrews in Scotland.
Woods, still affected by a significant right leg injury sustained during a 2021 car crash, is playing just his third tournament this year. He made the cut at both the Masters and PGA Championship, but withdrew from the latter and then skipped June’s US Open in order to recover his leg for the 150th Open at St Andrews.
The 15-time Major winner, this week returning to the site of his 2000 and 2005 Open Championship wins, was asked whether he agreed with the R&A’s decision to not invite Norman to a four-hole past champions exhibition on Monday night.
Norman won two Opens in his stellar career – 1986 at Turnberry and 1993 at Royal St George’s – and was eligible for the exhibition that included Woods, Lee Trevino, Rory McIlroy and Georgia Hall, among others. But Norman was informed recently he was not welcome given he is now the chief executive of LIV Golf, and the media hype of his presence would have detracted from the 150th Open celebrations.
Woods, a three-time Open winner overall, supported the R&A’s decision. He also referenced Norman’s failed attempt to create a world golf tour in the 1990s, which the PGA Tour then used as the framework to create the World Golf Championships.
“Greg has done some things I don’t think are in the best interests of golf,” Woods said about Norman’s LIV Golf, which is two events into its debut series of eight tournaments boasting $US25 million purses. “We’re coming back to probably the most historical place and it (not inviting Norman) was the right thing.
“I know Greg tried to do this back in the early ’90s. It didn’t work then, and he’s trying to make it work now. I still don’t see how that’s in the best interests of the game. What the European Tour and what the PGA Tour stands for and what they’ve done, as well as the governing bodies of the game and the Major championships… I think they see it differently than what Greg sees it.”
Woods also hit out at players who had taken massive paycheques to join LIV Golf, a move that came with the punishment of a ban from the PGA Tour. High-profile recruits to LIV include multiple Major winners Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson and Brooks Koepka, as well as Patrick Reed and Bryson DeChambeau.
“Players who have chosen to go to LIV… I disagree with it,” Woods said. “I think that what they’ve done is they’ve turned their back on what has allowed them to get to this position (the PGA Tour and DP World/European Tour).
“Some players have… gone right from the amateur ranks right into that organisation (LIV) and never really got a chance to play out here and what it feels like to play a tour schedule or to play in some big events.
“Who knows what’s going to happen in the near future with world ranking points? The criteria for entering Major championships? The governing bodies are going to have to figure that out.
“Some of these players may not ever get a chance to play in Major championships; we don’t know that for sure yet. Some players will never, ever get a chance to… walk down the fairways at Augusta National. That, to me, I just don’t understand it.”
