Two-time Open champion Greg Norman has been encouraged to consider a ticket resale platform to attend this year’s Championship at Royal Troon.
The R&A’s director of corporate communications Mike Woodcock said he wasn’t aware of an invitation sent to the Australian, nor has he seen his name on the purchased tickets list.
Norman, the chief executive of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf League, has seemingly been denied an offer to the Ayrshire links this summer, a fate not too dissimilar from two years ago when he wasn’t invited to the Champions’ Dinner at the 150th Open at St Andrews.
“I don’t think there’s a G. Norman (on the list),” Woodcock said at an Open media day. “I think they would have let me know if there was. So I’m not aware that he’s bought a ticket so far.
“Obviously, there are tickets still available on the resale platform or hospitality. He’s very welcome to look there.”
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Greg Norman: Open Championship invitation snub strikes again
Norman hasn’t split opinion but rather blown it to a thousand pieces since giving birth to the LIV Golf League in June 2022. The league has attracted some of the biggest names in the game with big-money offers over the last 24 months but has also been subjected to ridicule and criticism by fans of golf’s traditional establishment in the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour.
Hostility appeared to be cooled on June 6, 2023 when a framework agreement between the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund, the Saudi sovereign wealth fund that bankrolls LIV Golf, was announced, but a solidified deal is yet to be found 10 months later.
Norman attended this year’s Masters tournament as a paying member of the public to support the 13 players from the LIV Golf roster who had qualified to play in the first major of the year.
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In 2023, the Masters didn’t invite Norman because tournament organisers wanted “the focus to be on the competition” and perhaps away from the division between LIV Golf and the PGA Tour. The three-time Augusta runner-up described this as “petty” when speaking to the Telegraph, a word he also used to describe his banishment from proceedings at the home of golf in 2022.
“As a major winner I always was before, but they only sent me a grounds pass last year and nothing, zilch, this time around,” he said a year ago. “I’m disappointed because it’s so petty but of course, I’ll still be watching.”
The 152nd Open at Troon has been revealed to be a 250,000-spectator sell-out and the course has been lengthened to 7,385 yards.
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