Sir Bob Charles Photo: PHOTOSPORT
Golfing legend Sir Bob Charles says he will be asking questions at a Canterbury Golf dinner on Friday night about whether they would host a LIV Golf event next year.
The Christchurch Golf Club has confirmed to Checkpoint representatives from the Saudi-backed tournament had visited, but nothing had been locked in.
Critics believe the controversial big-dollar league is sportswashing, with Saudi Arabia attempting to distract from its appalling human rights record - including its brutal assassination of a journalist in Turkey in 2018.
But Sir Bob, who is a patron of the Christchurch club, wants nothing to do with it. If the event goes ahead, he will make sure he is as far away as he can get - probably Millbrook, 400 kilometres away.
"The traditional game that I've played for 50 years travelling around the world is in total upheaval and they're causing havoc - they're causing problems, and I just have no time for LIV whatsoever."
LIV Golf not going game any favours - Sir Bob Charles
LIV launched in 2022. It was bankrolled by the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, and its CEO was Australian golfing legend Greg Norman.
Other golf stars, including former world number one Rory McIlroy, have also lamented the split in the golfing world, urging the PGA and LIV to "bring it all back together" so the world's best players are competing in the same tournaments.
He said while no one could "totally wreck" the sport, he could not condone the tournament's "bribery and corruption".
"They've been offered some obscene sums of money and some of the guys that play, I've never ever heard of… I don't know that they deserve the money which they have been offered."
Nor was he a fan of its aesthetic changes.
"It's not the traditional game… we had a certain set of rules, we had an organisation and they're a bunch of boys playing in short pants. So I've got nothing nice to say about them whatsoever."
Sir Bob said he did not have any inside word on which way the club might swing.
"Nobody's communicated with me. I know nothing."
Lydia Ko. Photo: AFP/PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU
Elsewhere in the golfing world, Sir Bob had praise for gold medallist at the Paris Olympics, Lydia Ko, who was now eligible for the LPGA Hall of Fame.
A birdie on the 18th at Le Golf National saw her score 10-under, to claim the gold, two shots ahead of her closest competitor.
"That was fantastic. I'm proud of her," Sir Bob said. "She's certainly had her ups and downs recently, and most of them have been downs… But she enjoyed a lot of success, prior to this event and I think this gold medal at the Olympics is the icing on the cake."