Rory McIlroy Attends Key Meeting Between PGA Tour And PIF As 'Progress' Is Made In Deal Talks
The four-time Major winner attended the New York meeting remotely after his second round at the Memorial Tournament
Rory McIlroy attended a meeting on Friday evening between the PGA Tour Enterprises Transaction Subcommittee and the Saudi Public Investment Fund behind LIV Golf, where, according to a statement from the subcommittee, “progress was made.”
The meeting took place in New York City, and on the PGA Tour side, Tiger Woods and Adam Scott also attended, along with commissioner Jay Monahan, the subcommittee’s chairman Joe Gorder, player liaison Joe Ogilvie and Strategic Sports Group principal John Henry. PIF was represented by governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan and his team.
The statement read: "Representatives from the PGA Tour Enterprises Transaction Subcommittee and the PIF have been meeting multiple times weekly to work through potential deal terms and come to a shared vision on the future of professional golf.”
"On Friday evening, an in-person session in New York City included the entire Transaction Subcommittee and PIF Governor Yasir Al-Rumayyan and his team, where more progress was made."
It continued: “We remain committed to these negotiations, which require working through complex considerations to best position golf for global growth
“We want to get this right, and we are approaching discussions with careful consideration for our players, our fans, our partners and the game’s future.”
The anniversary of the news that the PGA Tour and PIF had begun negotiations over the future of the men’s elite game has now passed, while it's approaching six months since the initial deadline to agree details on a framework agreement came and went.
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Since then, there have been some signs of progress. Before The Players Championship in March, Monahan revealed negotiations were “accelerating,” and after the TPC Sawgrass event, members of the PGA Tour policy board, including Woods, met with Al-Rumayyan in the Bahamas.
Despite stepping down from his position on the PGA Tour policy board in November, McIlroy, who attended remotely after the second round of the Memorial Tournament, still holds significant influence on the PGA Tour and has regularly discussed his opinions on what the future may look like for top-level golf with the Tour working alongside LIV Golf.
Even though a move to rejoin the board didn’t come to fruition, the confirmation McIlroy attended the most recent meeting with the PIF suggests he still has a role to play in the negotiations.
After his first round at the Memorial Tournament, McIlroy admitted he had considered flying to New York for the meeting mid-tournament. He said: “There’s going to be people in that room on the Tour side who are going to take the lead. And it’s not going to be Adam, Tiger or me. That’s going to be Jay, Joe and John Henry. It’s going to be the business guys.
“We’re there to maybe give a perspective from a player’s point of view. This is a negotiation about an investment in the PGA Tour Enterprises, this is big boy stuff. And I’ll certainly be doing more listening than I will be doing talking."
Mike has over 25 years of experience in journalism, including writing on a range of sports throughout that time, such as golf, football and cricket. Now a freelance staff writer for Golf Monthly, he is dedicated to covering the game's most newsworthy stories.
He has written hundreds of articles on the game, from features offering insights into how members of the public can play some of the world's most revered courses, to breaking news stories affecting everything from the PGA Tour and LIV Golf to developmental Tours and the amateur game.
Mike grew up in East Yorkshire and began his career in journalism in 1997. He then moved to London in 2003 as his career flourished, and nowadays resides in New Brunswick, Canada, where he and his wife raise their young family less than a mile from his local course.
Kevin Cook’s acclaimed 2007 biography, Tommy’s Honour, about golf’s founding father and son, remains one of his all-time favourite sports books.
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