For the first time since the Circuit Wars broke out, the leaders of the three major tours will meet on a course for the Dunhill Links Championship in St Andrews. What if the birthplace of golf were to serve as the crucible for a historic deal that would put an end to the terrible circuit war that has been shaking the golfing world for three years? In the Dunhill Links Championship, the DP World Tour tournament that begins Thursday in the Home of Golf in St Andrews in Scotland and where pros and celebrities are associated during the first three rounds, Jay Monahan, the commissioner of the PGA Tour, will play alongside the recent winner of the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth, Billy Horschel.
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But in this Thursday game that will start on the 10th at Carnoustie, the boss of the American circuit will also be with Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the head of the PIF, the Saudi Public Investment Fund behind the creation of LIV Golf.
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The latter will take part in this unique event for the second time, but this time, no rumors have circulated concerning the possibility that Al-Rumayyan will use an assumed name as in the 2023 edition. In addition to the two key figures in this rivalry between circuits, it is worth noting the presence of the CEO of the DP World Tour, Guy Kinnings, who sided with the American circuit from the start by aligning himself with the decisions of the PGA Tour, particularly with regard to the sanctions imposed on dissident players.
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This information should be compared to the presence of 14 LIV players at the start of the Scottish triptych on three legendary courses in Fife County: the Old Course of St Andrews, Carnoustie and Kingsbarns. Indeed, Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Tyrrell Hatton, Patrick Reed and the American Talor Gooch, for example, were authorized to line up.
(read here). A sign that should indicate to Monahan that if no agreement is reached quickly, the possibility of a rapprochement between the LIV and the DP World Tour to create a new world order of golf does indeed exist. And it would put an end to the strategic alliance between the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour signed at the end of 2021.
We are far from it since Kinnings' objective remains a tripartite agreement in which the big stars of the PGA Tour decide to cross the Atlantic more often in order to perform all over the world: Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia.
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Finally, note that Al-Rumayyan will also have the opportunity to exchange at length with a certain Rory McIlroy, very favorable to the creation of a world circuit on the five continents. Indeed, the Northern Irishman, who has distanced himself from the PGA Tour Players Council, probably due to disagreements with Jordan Spieth and Patrick Cantlay, who are not very inclined to broaden the horizons of the American circuit, will share the game with the Saudi businessman on Saturday on the Old Course in the company of his father Gerry.
