PGA Tour director makes telling admission over ‘divided’ policy board as LIV Golf saga rolls on
The PGA Tour and Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia remain in negotiation over the American-based circuit reaching some sort of peace agreement with LIV Golf
PGA Tour policy board director Joe Ogilvie admitted that reports over the circuit’s policy board being ‘divided’ and ‘dysfunctional’ are ‘fair’, as golf’s leading circuit continue to negotiate with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia (PIF).
The Tour have been locked in a battle with their LIV Golf rivals for two years, however 12 months ago it appeared the feud was set to come to an end. Last June PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan revealed the circuit had reached a framework agreement with PIF that would reunite professional golf.
One year on though, the sport remains split in two with the two rival sides yet to officially sign off any sort of peace deal. With the PGA Tour and PIF set to enter a second year of negotiations, frailties regarding the deal have began to show.
The Tour’s policy board has become more important than ever in a bid to complete an agreement, however Monahan and co’s work has come under scrutiny. In recent weeks two directors in Jimmy Dunne and Mark Flaherty have resigned from their roles, with unrest also among the playing quota too.
In November, Rory McIlroy opted to resign as a player director having found himself embroiled at the centre of the off-course saga. Last month he shared his interest in returning to the board, but his request was turned down amid reported opposition from the likes of Patrick Cantlay and Tiger Woods.
Former player Ogilvie does have a seat at the policy board table, and admitted there are some issues than need ironing out. Asked if the board was ‘dysfunctional’ and ‘divided’, he told Golfweek: “Yeah, that is a fair statement.” Highlighting the poor handling of the PIF negotiations, he continued: “In retrospect, if you had a big mulligan you’d certainly handle the Framework Agreement differently.
“I think everybody involved would say they bungled the rollout of that… It was basically a very closed decision-making process on doing the Framework Agreement. It was almost unrecoverable from there. Something had to give once there wasn’t a two-week therapy session between the board.
“I don’t know if that’s the right way to term it, but it never happened. Humility goes a long way and I don’t think there was a whole lot of humility. That’s my take. I wasn’t involved in those discussions, but it did get divided. There were massive trust issues and once you lose trust, it’s incredibly hard to earn back.”
In March the Tour’s policy board met with PIF in the Bahamas as their negotiations continued, and one man who was in the room was Ogilvie. Opening up on the meet-up with Yasir Al-Rumayyan and his team, he added: “It was a perfect first meeting… It would be naive to think that we’re going to come out of that meeting with a handshake deal and say, ‘We’re done here.’ It was a very good meeting and you could see that there was a mutual respect between [Al-Rumayyan] and Jay, which is also good.
