TROUBLE WITH A CAPITAL TEE
McGinley is heartbroken by the civil war that has split golf
GOLF’S civil war intensified yesterday as hardening battle lines left Paul McGinley rueing the splits in the game.
The DP World Tour finally responded to stars, such as Lee Westwood and Ian Poulter, playing in this month’s inaugural Saudi Arabia-backed LIV event by banning them from next month’s Scottish Open and fining them £100,000.
It follows the PGA Tour suspending 17 members who played at the Centurion Club, where Charl Schwartzel won £3.86million.
Players who have joined the LIV series are still allowed to play in the 150th Open Championship at St Andrews next month.
But the DP World Tour, formerly known as the European Tour, has warned players that participation in further conflicting tournaments “without the required release may incur further sanctions”.
This is set to be as soon as next week when the second LIV event in the £200m eight-event invitational series is scheduled to take place in Portland, America.
Former European Ryder Cup captain McGinley, a member of the European Tour’s tournament committee and board of directors, said: “It is a real shame. I feel sad about it, I really do.
“Here are players who have stood shoulder to shoulder, some of them in Ryder Cup instances. Now there could be a case where there is a clear line in the sand – you are on this bus or that bus.
“That line is becoming clearer and clearer. It is really sad that it has come to that, where players are having to make a clear choice what side of the fence they are on.”
Ex-US Open champion and Ryder Cup ace Martin Kaymer, 37, who holed the winning putt at Medinah in 2012, is playing this week in Munich on the DP World tour, but is among rebels now unable to play in Scotland, along with Sergio Garcia and Graeme McDowell. He fears for the future of the Ryder Cup ahead of the tour announcing their qualification process later this year for Rome in 2023.
He said: “I will pay the £100,000 but I would love to play golf, that is my job.
“I would love to play in Scotland. I won the tournament before. I just hope it doesn’t affect the Ryder Cup too much.
“Hopefully everyone can sit down at the table and find solutions that are good for everybody and not bad for everybody.”
McGinley insists the tour was right to act and suggested the rebels face more fines for playing in other LIV events.
He said: “We have a member’s regulations handbook which all of the players sign up to. We feel £100,000 is a significant amount of money and is proportionate for the clear breach that has happened.
“The players have played one event in London on European soil. We are dealing with it one step at a time. If there is a second breach, we may well look at something else.
“In terms of the Ryder Cup, Henrik Stenson is captain and doing a lot of work behind the scenes. The points haven’t started yet and I think, by the time the points start, there has to be some clear decisions made.”
But McGinley admits he can understand why some have joined LIV, with fourtime Major champion Brooks Koepka the latest big-name to follow Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau and Phil Mickelson.
“A lot of players see the value of taking tens of millions and, in some cases, hundreds of millions to join,” he added. “It is telephone numbers that are being put on the table.”