Tommy Fleetwood: Missing LIV Golfers take nothing away from The Players

Tommy Fleetwood is entirely unfazed by the absence of big names at The Players Championship.

The Southport man said he’d be happy as the only player in the field if it meant his hands were on the trophy at TPC Sawgrass.

At an event that claims to have the best field in the sport, the likes of Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka and 2022 Players champion Cameron Smith now ply their trade in the LIV Golf League – the other side of golf’s fence which, if you join it, leads to suspension from the PGA Tour.

Rahm’s choice to join the breakaway league’s roster ahead of the 2024 season burned a significant hole in the PGA Tour’s membership list, being the reigning Masters champion and World No.3.

When asked if the defection of these key figures takes away from the tournament in Ponte Vedra, Fleetwood referred back to his dreams of winning events such as The Players during his ascension to becoming one of the world’s best players.

“If I win The Players… if there was just me in the field, I’d be perfectly happy,” he said at the Stadium Course on Wednesday.

“I would play with the media team, and I’d be happy winning the players! I’ve got a chance; I would rather it be like that!

“I don’t think so, tournaments like last week (Arnold Palmer Invitational), The Players Championship, the BMW at Wentworth, you can rattle off tons of events that a bunch of us as golfers have dreamt of winning as a kid, have dreamt of playing in as a kid and I don’t think who is playing in it takes anything away from those achievements, in terms of what you’ve fought for and practised for all of your life.

“I have kids that are in the game now that are trying to be the best they can be and make it. For some people, it’s the dream to play in these events, they actually just want to get to The Players, they just want to get to the Wentworth, so I don’t think it takes anything away.

“Of course, you want to be challenging your game against the best players in the world, but for us, if we win one of these tournaments, I’m not going to put it in my trophy cabinet and be worried about a few players missing really.”

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Tommy Fleetwood: LIV Golf players being absent doesn’t take away from Players Championship

The Englishman, a winner of seven DP World Tour events but still a maiden in America, revealed he rejected an offer from LIV Golf while competing at the Dubai Desert Classic in January.

His compatriot Tyrrell Hatton addressed the same rumours at the same event and eventually jumped ship with Jon Rahm to LIV Golf. Hatton came second at last year’s Players Championship.

As stars of the game continue to join the Saudi-funded rival of the PGA Tour, which hosted its first event in June 2022, the division in professional golf has remained wide and without promise of coming together.

As the PGA Tour and the Public Investment Fund, the Saudi sovereign wealth fund that bankrolls LIV, continue their negotiations, one branch of the debate concerns the fans and the effect golf’s civil war has had on those who watch it and who now have a choice between the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour on television, or LIV Golf on YouTube or the app in the UK.

Speaking in a “brutally honest fashion” to reporters in Florida, Fleetwood said that golf is divided but, in the same breath, admitted to how arrowing focus on your career can lead to losing sight of the fan’s perspective.

“I can talk for myself on a personal level. I would say us as golfers, we get so carried away on chasing our career through no massive fault of our own,” he added.

“It wouldn’t necessarily come to the front of my mind all the time what’s going on with the fans. I’m always thinking about where’s the best place for me to get better, what’s the right schedule for me, how do I play in the majors and all of that. You get lost in your world in trying to get the most out of your career,

“I actually listened to something earlier on this year and it was about the fans, and it made complete sense because – people that watch the game, people that pay money to come to the game, people that take it up.

“It’s all part of everything that we’re doing, so I think it’s a huge part of it and very, very important – nobody really had that many positive things to say about that COVID time when we were playing and there were no fans, so it just shows what a huge part they play in the moments that we deem as the best moments of our career. I would say the fan are a big part of that.

“Not in a selfish way, you look at it from a career perspective. I look at everything as trying to be the best golfer I can be and chasing my dreams and all of that still.

“You just focus on yourself and how you’re getting the most out of your game really, but the fans and the fan interaction, I feel like most of us do a great job of the fan interaction when we’re here at the tournament, but maybe on the grander scale, you miss out and you look at it now, the best players aren’t playing together maybe and that’s something that’s missing.

“Golf is obviously divided and I would say its not having a very positive effect worldwide on the fans perspective, so I would say that on a bigger scale is something that we could do with putting right.”

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