PGA Tour risks being cut out of golf’s civil war deal because of pathetic entitlement

Jay Monahan must realise this week that Europe could join Saudis if no deal is reached with LIV Golf

For the first time since the LIV Golf saga erupted, the heads of the three golfing states are expected to be on public display at the same time and at the same venue this week.
And, in terms of the prospect of this trio aiding a peaceful resolution, perhaps it is apt that the stage will be St Andrews, ‘the Home of Golf’.
It has been confirmed to Telegraph Sport that Jay Monahan, the PGA Tour commissioner, will be playing in the Dunhill Links alongside recent Wentworth champion Billy Horschel and sources say that Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of the Saudi Public Investment Fund, is also expected to tee it up in the DP World Tour event that features amateurs appearing alongside the pros.
This would be the second time in as many years that Al-Rumayyan participates in the £3.7 million tournament, although it is a sign of easing tensions that on this occasion he will not have to arrive under the cover of darkness and bearing an assumed name.
The organisers still insist that the fact Al-Rumayyan was listed as “Andrew Waterman” – a fictional character – on the initial starting sheet in 2023 was not because they were indulging in subterfuge, but simply because as the PIF overlord is on the board of at least 40 companies – including, of course, as chairman of LIV Golf and Newcastle United – he could not commit until the 11th hour.
Fair enough, yet it must be wondered why they did not simply employ the normal “TBC”. Maybe it was all down to the mischievous humour of Johann Rupert, the South African billionaire who sponsors and essentially runs the Dunhill.
Since the sport’s civil war was triggered three years ago, Rupert has preached the necessity of unification and compromise and he will be delighted to see not only Al-Rumayyan, but, for the first time, also Monahan in Scotland, with DP World Tour chief executive Guy Kinnings obviously on site, as well as his chairman, Eric Nicoli (another influential figure, who in his previous business life invented the Yorkie chocolate bar).
Rupert is an arch deal-maker and will recognise the potential for his competition to have an impact on the sport’s future. The wily septuagenarian has managed to assemble what, after the Open Championship, could be claimed as the most star-studded male field on British soil this year.
There will be 14 LIV players on show, most notably Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Tyrrell Hatton, Patrick Reed and Talor Gooch. They are there on invites and on normal exemptions and the scenario highlights how straightforward it would be for the Tour to accommodate the LIV rebels.
Most pertinently, it should also underline to Monahan that if no deal is reached then the chances of the Saudis and the DP World Tour jumping in together and creating a properly funded global schedule would be very real indeed.
It is a scenario that Wenworth would naturally not even discuss when it signed the “strategic alliance” with its US counterparts in late 2021. But now, the possibility is so obvious that two weeks ago at the BMW PGA Championship, Kinnings acknowledged that in the wake of a breakdown in the peace talks, “we would have a few other options”.
It is understood that it would not be overly difficult to untether the “strategic alliance”, but the focus of Kinnings remains on  “the ultimate goal of all the parties coming together”. However, Kinnings kept repeating that he and his Tour want a “global” solution and the reason why is clear.
If the PGA Tour continues to operate almost exclusively in America and if the big-name players (Tiger Woods, Jordan Spieth and Patrick Cantlay), who now essentially control the circuit, refuse to see the big picture and agree actually to travel further than their Starred-and-Striped confines and with more regularity, then it will surely be impossible to reach any sort of agreement to benefit Wentworth HQ, beyond short-term survival.
As ever, Rory McIlroy is the only member of this elite willing, and perhaps able, to verbalise this issue and as he has the ear of Al-Rumayyan, the world No 3 knows exactly of what he speaks.
“If things don’t materialise with the PGA Tour, I think it would maybe bring the European Tour [sic] back to the Eighties and Nineties when there really was two strong tours,” he said. “And look, selfishly as a European, it would be wonderful to get that investment and to use that money in the right way for this tour – but it would still keep the game divided. However, it would be plan B to the best solution.”
Monahan will be acutely aware of this and following his week in the country where the sport was invented, he will be able to return to his players’ board and tell them of the great names competing on great courses and potentially with huge sums on offer. He will also be able to advise them of the dangers of remaining so pathetically insular and entitled.