This is the vision in action for a World Golf League
12 February 2025 - SHANK Media, by Matt Hooper: I have to begin by making a few comments about the season-opener, LIV Golf Riyadh, in response to the absolute nonsense I have read and heard in the last few days. Championship golf in Saudi Arabia is SIX years old, yet remarkably and outrageously, some believe the crowds for tournaments in the Kingdom should be on a scale with PGA TOUR events which have been played since the 1950's. There are just 2,680 registered golfers in Saudi Arabia, this is a new sport in a country which is almost entirely sand and mountains, and only has 5 current golf courses (with many others under construction or in design phase). The Saudi Golf Federation is only just over 25 years old, the USGA is 130 years old. The history is just not there, the embedded tradition of going to golf events year in year out is not there, and the passion for the sport is not there, and it would be ridiculous to expect it to be.
Saudi Arabia, and Riyadh in particular is also not Dubai, not yet.
The Dubai Desert Classic was first played in 1989 at the Emirates Golf Club, in front of a crowd of next to nobody, and if you don't believe me then check out the Getty Images gallery here. The crowds grew steadily over the next two decades to reach what we see each January now. In 1995 some of the biggest names of the time came to Dubai, including Greg Norman, Fred Couples, Nick Price and Ernie Els visited Dubai when the tournament was in its infancy, and the Emirate only had a couple of golf courses. In 2001 Tiger Woods visited for the first time, at the peak of his powers, having won 3 Majors in 2000, and weeks away from going for a record 4th in a row at Augusta, Woods presence meant the tournament enjoyed its biggest crowds at the time. 7 years in 2008 later Woods won in dramatic fashion with a putt on the 72nd green, and the vast crowds roared, and the event had the atmosphere of any other top level PGA TOUR event.
Over those 20 years Dubai established itself, not just as a destination for high level professional golf, but as a mecca for golf and one of the great tourism cities on earth, and it has been able to attract many overseas people to move to the city. Dubai now has 14 golf courses, many designed by the great names in golf, and attracts 17 million tourists each year, many of which contribute to a golf industry which is worth upwards of $200million per year to the city. Dubai also has a population made up predominantly of non-UAE nationals, with less than 20% of its 3.5million population being native citizens. More than 280,000 UK/US citizens call Dubai home, and this helps boost the numbers of people interested in attending golf tournaments, with more than 500,000 rounds of golf played annually.
Saudi is not yet there, but that is the vision from LIV Golf and the Public Investment Fund, to reach that, and if they do then LIV Golf Riyadh, and the Saudi International, will be among the most popular spectator events outside the United States and Europe. A contact I have within the sport and industry was on site at Riyadh Golf Club last week, and he said this: "By far the best all-encompassing golf event I have ever been to or worked at from a personal perspective. The attention to detail is phenomenal & the promotional budget has been money well spent."
Expanding further he said "They spent more than $2 million on the fan zone alone, to try and attract families to the event, what they did was unbelievable both on the course, and off the course."
"This is the 7th event I have been at in Saudi, and there were a lot more spectators on the course than normal for an event in Riyadh or Jeddah. The Saudi weekend is Friday and Saturday, and they had concerts each night Thursday to Saturday, and that attracted a lot of people. The course is built in such a way that there are a lot of holes near to the clubhouse, making those holes more popular for spectators than some of the others. Particularly on Saturday it was rammed with spectators at this point."
He finished by saying "It was mind boggling how good it was, the level of access players give is incredible before the play starts. I have been to The Masters, The Open and worked at many other professional events on several tours, this is the best total experience. They are really pushing it out in Saudi, it really is phenomenal what they are trying to do to get people into the sport."
Many detractors of LIV Golf have used the word "circus" to try and demean the product, well it is a circus, a Grand Travelling Circus of Golf, taking the best golfers in the world to different countries and continents around the globe, playing a unique format trying to entertain people and grow the game. Nowhere better showcases that than this week's event, LIV Golf Adelaide.
Australia, and Adelaide, LOVES LIV Golf
Throughout the weekend of LIV Golf Adelaide 2024 social media was abuzz with discussion regarding the extraordinary support the LIV Golf event in Adelaide received, with more than 94,000 attending across the 3 days of the tournament, creating an incredible atmosphere. Many on Twitter suggested that it was just because Australia was desperate for top level golf, and that if the PGA Tour staged an event in Australia the turnout would be even greater.
Their narrative, or the one they want to create, is that it doesn't matter that it was LIV Golf staging the event, and that the fans don't care about the teams, and the shorter format. 7 Network are the broadcaster for LIV Golf in Australia, to the uninformed, that is the equivalent of ITV or BBC broadcasting LIV Golf in the UK. 7 were the Olympic Broadcaster in Australia until Nine took the rights from 2024.
2024's first day coverage reached a peak audience of 936,000 viewers, putting it inside the top 20 most-watched Australian telecasts that day. If you removed News programming then LIV Golf Adelaide would rank as the 7th most-watched programme on Australian linear television on Friday. Then day two coverage reached a peak audience of 1,038,000 viewers, making LIV Golf Adelaide the fifth most-watched programme on that day across Australia. Only three other non news programmes peaked at more than 1 million viewers.
In contrast, the Australian Open, the national Open of Australia with more than a century of history and tradition, broadcast on Network Nine, reached a peak of 167,000 viewers on Saturday and 433,000 on Sunday. Does some of that have to do with the fact that only a small handful of top players played in the Australian Open? Of course. But that reinforces the reason LIV Golf is so compelling. The field and format is consistent and fresh.
Australia has always been the land of innovation, going back to the World Series Cricket in the late 1970's and the Super League in Rugby League in the mid-1990's. They embrace change better than most people, and anyone who watched 2024's incredible final round cannot deny it was compelling. The team and individual, side-by-side, was enthralling. The conclusion was thrilling, and those on site and watching at home lapped it up. And it wasn't just in Australia that the event proved popular. Caffeine TV carried live coverage of Round One of each LIV Golf event until the platform ceased last Summer, and LIV Golf Adelaide had more than 2 million views, which follows 3 million views for the first day of the event in Miami.
LIV Golf is finding new ways to broadcast its content, transcending the sport to a new, younger and more diverse audience. LIV Golf Adelaide was one of the most-watched programmes in the younger demographic in Australia (under 40), with 145,000 individuals aged 16-39 viewing the final round, ranking it 10th in the most-watched programmes by this demographic.
"The place we want to be is Adelaide" said LIV Golf CEO Scott O'Neil.
"This is the one event we look forward to coming back" said Brooks Koepka. "This is the pinnacle of our events, it has set the bar for LIV".
"The feel walking around a LIV event is unique, it is a bit different" said South Australia Premier Peter Malinauskas, when asked why Adelaide and Australia had embraced LIV Golf. "We are not here but for Greg Norman's vision, he exercised the judgement to bring LIV Golf to Adelaide, it would have been easy to take it to the eastern seaboard of Australia."
"Adelaide (South Australia) has a reputation of getting an event, building it into a success, and then other jurisdictions come in an take it from us. We have to earn the right to keep it."
One such event which Malinauskas comments refer to is the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix. The Australian Grand Prix became a Formula 1 Grand Prix in 1985, and for a decade it was one of the most popular and impactful races on the calendar. Led by Mal Hemmerling, John Bannon’s team went into action and the entertainment package that the Adelaide Grand Prix Office put together was about to set a new benchmark for Formula One grand prix track presentation worldwide. (source: The Adelaide Review)
Then, in 1996 Melbourne replaced Adelaide.
28 years after the final Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide, the city had another global event arrive, and wow it has arrived, and it is a perfect match for the city, state and its people. LIV Golf Adelaide is now, without a doubt, the showcase event for LIV Golf, its concept and vision for the future.
Matt Adams, Fairways of Golf, made the 'alternative' suggestion that LIV Golf could declare LIV Golf Adelaide a LIV Golf Major Championship in any future framework for the sport once a deal is reached between the PGA TOUR and the PIF. He expanded by saying they could expand the field, and make it an 'Open' for players from other tours. However, it is firmly my view that LIV should not deviate too far from what makes it different, and from what makes it popular in Australia and other parts of the world. Instead, as part of a vision for the future of men's professional golf, LIV Golf should invest in golf in Australasia, in the same way it has done in Asia.
LIV Golf, working with the PGA of Australia, Golf Australia, PGA of New Zealand, Golf New Zealand and the existing board of the PGA Tour of Australasia, would help to fund and raise finance for tournament golf across the region. LIV would be the principal investor in the Australian Open and New Zealand Open, helping to elevate these events to global status, increasing prize funds to the same level as LIV Golf, and attracting the best players from around the world. These two prestigious, historic and traditional National Opens would succeed LIV Golf in the schedule, creating a three-week Australasian swing early in the season.
Then, in November, following the complete restructuring of Men's Professional Golf, which I will outline a vision for soon, the world's best return to Melbourne for a relaunched Australian Masters. Played at Royal Melbourne Golf Club, as the penultimate event before the season concludes in Dubai, the Australian Masters would have a similar field size to The Masters Tournament.
Rory McIlroy, speaking at the Genesis Invitational, made the assertion that post any deal with PIF the LIV Golf members who have status on the PGA TOUR should be allowed to return, and that effectively LIV Golf would disappear. He said he played with Donald Trump a few weeks back, and that the President does not like the LIV format. I will respond to this as politely as I possibly can. Rory has a long track record of being wrong about almost everything, including the Ryder Cup being an exhibition, the Olympics not mattering in golf, LIV Golf getting off the ground at all, and now he utters this absolute tosh.
The players on LIV have not put their reputations on the line, built up relationships with businesses and companies around the world to try and grow franchises to just be told by Rory McIlroy to give all that up, come back and play boring 72-hole golf with a cut, no music, no shotgun. The sooner this era of the pampered professional living in America is brought to an end the better, and Phil Mickelson's vision of professional golfers living wherever they want to live being reality. Golf is global, golf was invented in St Andrews, not St Augustine. The home of golf is St Andrews, not Ponte Vedra Beach. Rant over. Hope you found this thought provoking, and enjoy LIV Golf Adelaide, which will hopefully be with us for many, many more years to come.
My Vision for the Future of Men's Professional Golf will be published later this week on www.shankmedia.co.uk
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