End of LIV - Why Golf needs to modernise, not Americanise
When LIV Golf teed-up its inaugural event at the Centurion Club, St. Albans in 2022, it was with a mixture of excitement and scepticism.
There were those who saw it as the modernisation that the game desperately needed, but others who were convinced that it was nothing more than an audacious money grab.
What nobody doubted was its ambition. Backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) and fronted by some of the biggest names in the men's professional game, the league promised team-based competition, shorter events, and louder entertainment-first atmospheres designed to attract younger audiences.
It was bold and unashamedly brash, but only a few years after its launch, it looks less like a revolution and more like a bad day at the office.
Despite seemingly unlimited funding and headline-grabbing player signings, the league has failed to capture the mainstream imagination or build the credibility necessary to compete with the established tours.
But it has opened the world's eyes to what really fuels success in golf: it's history.
Events such as The Masters and The Open Championship carry decades of prestige. They are defined by their dramas, rivalries and iconic settings.
LIV Golf, by contrast felt manufactured. Its teams are inconsequential, its events lack significance, and its tournaments rarely produce moments that resonate beyond hardcore golf followers. It just came across as more gimmicky than innovative to most golf fans.
The format has also created confusion. LIV’s shotgun starts, team scoring, and abbreviated 54-hole events were intended to make golf more television-friendly. Instead, many viewers struggled to understand where everything was at.
Television ratings have also exposed another harsh reality. Despite signing stars such as Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka, and Dustin Johnson, LIV events have consistently drawn relatively small audiences compared to PGA Tour broadcasts. Proving that star power alone does not translate into sustained public interest.
Now it looks like PIF is about to pull the plug on its support and with good reason.
Because LIV Golf was never going to work. Not because the numbers didn’t add up, but because it was never going to be able to establish an emotional connection between fans and the product.
The team element - often sold as its biggest innovation - is a good example of why. LIV’s teams have no geographic identity, no deep-rooted fan bases, and little reason for spectators to develop loyalty, and while that might resonate with some US sports fans, it's an anathema to the rest of the world
Golf needs to change, but that doesn't mean it needs to get more American.
LIV Golf’s.attempt at modernising golf should still be a wake-up call. The game clearly needs to change, it just doesn’t need to get more American.
For more than a century, golf’s major championships have defined greatness in the sport. Winning The Masters or The Open Championship remains the ultimate measure of a player’s legacy. Yet despite golf’s transformation into a truly global game, the sport’s most prestigious events remain concentrated in two countries: the United States and the United Kingdom.
That imbalance no longer reflects modern golf.
Players from countries such as Japan, South Korea, China, Thailand, and India have become major forces in both men’s and women’s golf. Yani Tseng, Inbee Park, and Lydia Ko have helped reshape women’s golf through sustained excellence on the biggest stages. While Hideki Matsuyama winning The Masters in 2021 was a landmark moment not just for Japan, but for the whole of the continent’s four-and-a-half billion people.
That’s more than 60% of the world’s population.
If golf really wants to reach new, more youthful audiences, then this is where it needs to focus, and there is a fairly obvious way to do it: by taking a major championship to Asia.
The continent has already demonstrated its ability to host elite sporting events. From Formula One races in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore to the Olympic Games in Tokyo and Beijing, the region has repeatedly shown it can organise world-class international competitions with enormous audiences and commercial success.
Golf would not be taking a risk by bringing a major championship to Asia. It would be recognising reality.
The commercial potential is impossible to ignore. Asia represents one of the largest and fastest-growing sports markets in the world. Television audiences are massive, corporate sponsorship opportunities are enormous, and golf participation continues to expand among younger and wealthier populations.
A major championship in Asia would open the door to new fans, new traditions, and a new cultural significance for the sport.
Critics often argue that tradition should prevent the majors from expanding geographically. That every major has a distinct identity that’s key to its success. The Masters is tied to exclusivity and Augusta’s beauty. The U.S. Open is associated with brutal difficulty. The Open Championship celebrates traditional links golf and weather.
But then there's the PGA! Who won the Wanamaker last year or the year before?
Re-inventing that on the other side of the world would send a message that would resonate well beyond golf.
There is an important fairness argument here as well. Professional golfers from Asia often travel across the world to compete at the highest level, adapting constantly to different climates, grasses, and time zones. Yet the sport’s biggest championships rarely ask Western players to make the same journey eastward.
An Asian major would balance that out while adding another level of attainment for the winner.
Creating an Asian major then, would strengthen golf’s traditions not weaken them. The competition would develop its own personality, iconic moments and rivalries in a way that another Western major never could, and it would not be repeating the mistake that LIV has made. It would be building on golf’s traditions, not trampling all over them. That’s the lesson the sport now needs to move forward with.
Gavin McClement
