'A Fantastic Buffet Of Golf Throughout The Year' - Have We Had First Glimpse Of The Future Of Golf?

Throughout the long, ongoing saga that is the protracted merger talks between the PGA and Saudi PIF the question keeps on coming back to just what will golf look like if and when we get an agreement.

We've merely had platitudes from the main protagonists so far with limited updates on "talks progressing" and "complex situations" that need addressing before a roadmap for the future can be hashed out.

It's all very frustrating as the lack of detail suggests the future still isn't known, but we may have just a glimmer of hope and a glimpse of the future thanks to one high-ranking executive working for DP World - the title sponsor of the European Tour.

In an exclusive interview with Gulf News, Daniel Van Otterdijk gave an unusually upbeat update on the situation when claiming a deal could be done in six months.

What's more, even though DP World has no direct involvement in the discussions, as title sponsors of the European Tour they will have some knowledge of the details - and Van Otterdijk was very firm in how he saw things panning out.

And in his opinion, the upshot of months, stretching into years of negotiations will be a full year of top-level golf, with the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and LIV Golf all having their own place in the calendar.

“I can see an end-to-end calendar from January to December, where there's a prominent place for the PGA Tour, a prominent place for LIV Golf, and a prominent place for the DP World Tour, but there will be overlaps," Van Otterdijk told Gulf News.

“A guy like Tommy (Fleetwood) can say, ‘Look, I want to keep my PGA Tour card, I want to play on the DP World Tour, but I'd like to play some LIV Golf events as well.’

“I think LIV Golf will combine their current team structure – that will probably drop, but they'll still have team events.

“If it's done right, and we think it will be, you could see this fantastic buffet of golf throughout the year in different places around the world, and one or two different formats that we aren’t used to seeing, such as team events.

“I'm confident that there will be an end-to-end calendar with about 60 tournaments, with players looking to play around 25 in order to gather all the points they need if they play well.

“If they don't play so well, they can add some events throughout the year, and then at the end of the year, you tally up the points and they are where they are. I think that will be great for the sport.”

How could the future of golf look?

There's a lot of sense in what Van Otterdijk has described as the new future of golf - and as we've said he may not be at the table but he will have some knowledge of what is going on.

Ultimately one of the main sticking points is players from LIV Golf who may want to return to the PGA Tour - even if there's not many of them - and what mechanism is used for that reintegration.

There's a lot of ill feeling still between a lot of the PGA Tour membership, especially those outside of the top 30 or so players - with the elite crop the main beneficiaries of the new riches rolling into the game.

Rory McIlroy's previous 'Champions League' format idea is similar to that put forward by Van Otterdijk but with perhaps this latest one having more of a focus on each different tour having their own spot in the calendar.

An interesting point is van Otterdijk being fairly certain that LIV Golf will ditch the current league format but continue to be a team-based competition to offer a varied format within that yearly structure.

So, it looks pretty simple on the surface, but when you factor in world ranking points, access to Majors and the all-important financial rewards, then once again it's a massive knot of red tape that needs to be untangled in order for golf to finally move forward.