Former Masters winner Adam Scott says regardless of the status of any rival league, Australia deserved an annual world-class event.
ADAM Scott says he is as interested as any fan to see how the latest proposal for a shake-up to professional golf plays out.
Speaking with Australian Golf Digest, the 2013 Masters winner said he was watching from the sidelines as fellow Australian Greg Norman revealed he had become the face of a new 10-event series on the Asian Tour.
Norman was last week named CEO of LIV Golf, a majority Saudi Arabian-funded entity that will pump $US200 million into the Asian Tour over the next 10 years, with rumours an announcement of a rival league to the PGA Tour will follow.
Scott said his position hadn’t changed from a similar concept in early 2020, which was called the Premier Golf League, in that he believed healthy competition among tours was good for the game.
“My thoughts have remained the same on this; for me any concept of a premium tour that travels around the world is something I’m in favour of… especially as an international player,” Scott said.
The 14-time PGA Tour winner said Australia deserved a regular world-class tournament and hoped that was achieved regardless of what happens with any rival tour or the PGA Tour.
“It would be great to see a large event in Australia on an annual basis once again,” he said.
“We deserve it as a golfing nation; we have the courses that fans will want to watch on TV and we have a strong history over the last 70 years ago of producing great players. I’d be hopeful that’s an outcome that can be achieved.”
On Wednesday, Norman told this publication’s editor-in-chief, Brad Clifton, that Australia could be one of the beneficiaries of the new 10-event series on the Asian Tour.
In that interview, Norman rejected claims he was challenging the PGA Tour by launching the Asia series.
The PGA Tour, it must be said, is exploring how to include Australia “in a ‘global series’ in the [autumn] with big purses, no cuts and appearance money based on a player’s FedEx Cup standing”, according to Associated Press golf writer Doug Ferguson.
Although that would be exciting for Australian fans, it is believed Australia would not receive an annual event under this proposal, instead rotating between countries.
Meanwhile, Scott will return to competition next week at the PGA Tour’s Houston Open, which he won in 2007, before teeing up at the PGA Tour’s RSM Classic on Sea Island in Georgia.
– @EvinPriest
