With all the uncertainty in the world lately, not least in the Middle East, there remain substantial doubts as to whether the final two Grand Prix of the Formula 1 season will take place as scheduled in Qatar and Abu Dhabi. But European golf has given the go-ahead to the region, despite the ongoing threat of aerial bombardments from Iran. The season’s finale, the DP World Tour Championship, gets underway tomorrow in Dubai and the penultimate tournament of this campaign, the Abu Dhabi Aldar Championship, concluded on Sunday.
The leaderboard at Yas Links was heavily laden with former LIV players. Jon Rahm finished two shots ahead of his Ryder Cup buddy, Tyrrell Hatton, while David Puig and Bernd Wiesberger also recorded top-five finishes. Of course, these days anyone who played the LIV golf circuit is now a former LIV player. That show is over. It began in June 2022 and while it was financed by Saudi money there is no doubt that in terms of its public image its front man was an Aussie, Greg Norman. Yes, Greg was the Guy – which makes it seem rather apt that LIV’s demise was effectively sealed in a New Jersey courthouse on Bonfire Night. (Feel free to insert your own joke here about the thing going up in flames.) Given the harsher line adopted by the PGA Tour in terms of accepting returnees, it may be that the DP World Tour will be seeing quite a lot of Bryson DeChambeau next year.
On social media, the two-time US Open champion posted: “Arnold Palmer said no player is bigger than the game, and I want to acknowledge that along the way I’ve said some things that didn’t help. Whatever comes next, I’ll approach it with humility and respect for the people who carried this game long before me.” I’m not sure anyone ever thought DeChambeau was ‘carrying’ the game but let’s be charitable and figure he meant before he came along. And also urge that the next time he gets involved in a rules dispute at a major championship, as he did at Birkdale in July, he doesn’t threaten to take his case to the American president.
Anyhow, in Dubai this week Rory McIlroy will be attempting to emulate Colin Montgomerie by winning the Race to Dubai for an eighth time. (In Monty’s day, it was called the Order of Merit.) McIlroy is presently second in the standings, behind Eugenio Chacarra, a 26-year-old Spaniard who is playing his first full season on the tour. A top-three finish for McIlroy, assuming he finishes ahead of Chacarra, would most likely do the job, although Patrick Reed, in third spot with this final event to go, could also insert himself into the equation. Reed, of course, is another former LIV player, and it would definitely be fair to say that he and McIlroy have frequently not seen eye-to-eye. It should be quite a week.