Nobody expects Nick Faldo to deal niceties when asked for thoughts on the LIV Golf League, and he drilled the PGA Tour rival at his latest opportunity Thursday previewing the British Masters.
The six-time major winner questioned the circuit’s shift to add emphasis to team play in its second season and predicted the stroke play format of the PGA Tour and traditional golf would surely be the path forward in any combined organization. The PGA Tour agreed in early June to merge with Saudi-backed LIV Golf.
“Nobody’s really interested,” Faldo said. “They’re not going to get the sponsorship that they want. They call it a team [event] and it’s not because it’s stroke play. You see your mates on the putting green and say, ‘Play well,’ and you see them in the scorer’s tent and say, ‘What did you shoot?’ That’s it. A team is out there helping, shoulder to shoulder. That’s a true team.
“You have the ultimate team event, the Ryder Cup, you know the passion and the atmosphere of that. They’re not playing with the same passion and atmosphere as the Ryder Cup.”
Faldo said the lingering tension and confusion about what any combined tour merging LIV Golf, the DP World Tour and the PGA Tour would shift to are only temporary issues. Faldo said the game will be stronger when it finally emerges from the other side.
“I think when the dust settles, whether it takes six months, a year, whatever, my goodness, pro golf is in an overall better position financially than we were back in the day,” he said of the financial support golf is experiencing.
“Australia has struggled. I used to love playing in those places. I was one of the few guys who really did generally play a world tour back in the day. Seve [Ballesteros] played, Greg [Norman] did. We went everywhere, all four corners of the world. Those tours really missed out. I would love to see everyone given a chance to play and to be seen in those countries. With the guarantor, whatever you want to call it, pro golf is in a pretty darned good place.”
Reuters contributed to this report.