A rebel without applause? Poulter doesn’t think so...
AREBEL without applause? When Ian Poulter walked on to the first tee of the Old Course and a couple of blokes in the crowd booed him, the frenzied world of social media just about tweeted itself hoarse. The reality of the situation, of course, was slightly different. Isn’t it always?
“I didn’t hear one,” said Poulter, one of 24 players competing in The Open who have controversially signed up to the breakaway LIV Golf Series. “I actually thought
I had a great reception on the first tee. All I heard was clapping.”
Despite hooking his opening tee-shot so far left he just about required the media centre shuttle bus to ferry him to his ball, Poulter made his par before trundling in a jawdropping putt of some 150 feet across the vast ninth green on his way to a three-under 69. The rebel received plenty of applause for that one.
“That was a Brucie bonus,” he said of a monstrous putt that travelled so far, it could have claimed mileage on the expenses.
“You don’t ever hole those putts.”
Not long after Poulter had signed his card, Phil Mickelson, another high profile LIV Golf defector, emerged in front of the writers to mull over a level-par 72. Dressed from head-to-toe in black – his sponsors have deserted him due to his involvement with the controversial Saudi-backed circuit – Mickelson displayed about as much jovial gusto as a state funeral.
The words he spouted belied his rather haunted countenance.
“I couldn’t be more excited and ecstatic with where I’m at,” he said of his new career on the LIV Series. It was a strange delivery.
Mickelson, a rampaging
Open winner at Muirfield in 2013, did not play in The R&A’s Celebration of Champions event on Monday, nor did he attend the past champions’ dinner the following night. Discussions about him not being present, he claimed, were instigated by The R&A, who had also told the LIV Golf chief, Greg Norman, to stay away from the festivities.
“The R&A contacted me a couple weeks before and said, ‘Look, we don’t think it’s a great idea you go, but if you want to, you can’,” Mickelson said. “I just didn’t want to make a big deal about it, so I said, ‘Fine’. We both kind of agreed that it would be best if I didn’t.”
Pressed on his absence and asked by one reporter why he could feel content at being ostracised from a glittering gathering of greats, Mickelson snapped.
“Let it go, dude,” he said.
“Let it go. That’s three times you’ve asked the same question. I don’t know what to tell you. I couldn’t be happier.”
With some of the game’s powerful figures unleashing withering condemnation of the LIV Golf Series – Tiger Woods savaged the concept in the build up to The Open – Mickelson took a diplomatic stance.
“I certainly respect his opinion,” Mickelson said of Woods’ swipe. “I have a lot of respect for him. I respect his opinion. I think everybody’s going to have strong emotions and opinions.”
Mickelson’s LIV Golf ally, Lee Westwood joined the debate after posting an opening 68. With Woods suggesting players had “turned their backs” on the PGA Tour, Westwood said: “He’s got a vested interest hasn’t he?
“The LIV players will talk the LIV Tour up. The PGA Tour players that aren’t on the LIV Tour will talk the PGA Tour up and put down the LIV Tour.”
With the likes of Westwood, Poulter and Bryson DeChambeau flying the LIV Golf flag in the upper echelons of the early leaderboard, the rebels showed they have an Open cause.