Colin Sheridan: There isn’t enough fade or back-spin in golf to mask the villainy of this enterprise
USA's Phil Mickelson of HY Flyers GC, putts on the 15th green, during day three of the LIV Golf Invitational Series at the Centurion Club, Hertfordshire. Photo credit: Kieran Cleeves/PA Wire.
In November 2017, then Lebanese prime minister Saad Hariri visited his close ally, Saudi Arabia, expecting to go on a camping trip with the Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman. A billionaire businessman and statesman, Hariri was used to a certain degree of diplomatic protocol, which to his distress, he found to be lacking upon his arrival in Riyadh. In lieu of the usual limousines and honour guard, he was stripped of his cellphones and manhandled by state security guards, who accompanied him to his Riyadh home, where he was told to wait - under house arrest - for further instructions.
The following day, live on Saudi television, he read from a script prepared for him by his Saudi friends, and resigned as the Prime Minister of Lebanon, further de-stabilising an already fractured region. The footage of Hariri’s TV resignation would be funny if the repercussions weren’t so serious. He clearly reads aloud words he did not write or endorse, likely seeing them for the first time. Following his statement, Hariri remained in Riyadh for another ten days, during which, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights later concluded in a report "Hariri had been the victim of psychological torture and treatment which may amount to cruel, inhuman and degrading.
Following intense diplomatic interventions from the West, Hariri was released and travelled to France to recuperate, whereupon he insisted his trip to Saudi Arabia had been an agreeably pleasant one. A week later, back in Beirut, free from the literal shackles of his Saudi captors - he un-resigned.
Hariri’s on-air resignation sprang to mind last week, as another filthy-rich businessman appeared in front of the cameras, with a similar script to read. Phil Mickhelson, the American golfer with a net worth of over $400 million, sat in front of a packed media tent at the Centurion Club outside London, and went to bat for LIV Golf (ironically - almost absurdly - pronounced LIVE!, as in, to live), the new Saudi backed tour which he, along with fellow major winners Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau, Charl Shrwatzel, Sergio Garcia and Grame McDowell have become posterboys and patsies for.
Michelson, like Hariri, spoke like a man who had just been manhandled by his suitors - joyless, deep breathing, much less considered than contrived, he appeared at any moment like he was going to refer all difficult questions to his solicitor. Those that followed him - Ian Poulter, Lee Westwood and some nobodies you could almost forgive for taking the soup - peddled the same prepared talking points.
They spoke about life as independent contractors as if they were tradespeople or primary school teachers, unable to get a job at home, heading to Dubai to secure a living. They spoke about growing a game as if it were some misunderstood vegetable that just needed a little Saudi fertiliser. They riffed on using the sport as a force for good (let's face it, even for the regular weekend golfer, the game is less a force for good and more a medium of frustration, self loathing and existential crisis).
At one point, McDowell, who unlike Michelson, erroneously fancied himself enough to ad lib the script, told the media “there’s not a whole lot we can do about it”. By 'it', we could take it to mean, like, everything. “As players”, he continued, “we are aware of the consequences of what may lay ahead of us…”
He went on to speak about wanting to “keep the moral high ground” and edifying the “execution level” the players were witnessing from the team at LIV (did I mention it’s pronounced “LIVE”?). In the space of a personally catastrophic hour for his intellect and reputation, McDowell went from the likeable we once thought we knew to a willing pawn in a chess game of odious and insidious motive. Hearing McDowell even utter the words Jamal Khashoggi - the name of the journalist murdered by Saudi agents - with his mid-Atlantic drawl, was vomit-inducing.
It’s worth pointing out that most golfers who can afford to, hate coming to England to golf. Despite their public sycophancy towards tradition that pours forth like wine at a wedding during the British Open, American golfers especially revile the wind and the rain that can fall at any moment, regardless of the month. That’s one of the reasons so many of them live in Florida. The other being preferential tax conditions, which also points to their primary motivation; vast accumulation of wealth, in short sleeves.
Which makes their presence in England all the more depressing. There’s a saying that “beauty is pain”, but there is no beauty in any of this, quite precisely because there is no pain, not for the players, their caddies and agents, all of whom will profit handsomely at the expense of others, for whom there is nothing but pain.
There isn’t enough draw or fade or back-spin in the world of golf to mask the villainy of this enterprise. Their bank balances may swell to the point of spilling over as a consequence of their decisions, but their vacuous words of defence for the project they endorse are as empty as the hearts and worlds of the nameless, faceless people who have suffered and continue to suffer at the hands of a nefarious regime, one that seeks to legitmise their greed and power with the same abandon they disregard human rights, or the rights of sovereign nations. As long as there has been big money in sport, there has been conflict between purity and profit, but there has never been a more blatant example of good versus evil.
Profit is not even a motivation in the creation of this tour. Buying legitimacy is. In aiding and abetting that motive, these players have morally bankrupted themselves.
Ignorance should be the preserve of the poor and the needy, not the middle-class northern-Irishman and the millionaire golfer whose gambling debts reportedly ran to $40million. For their choices, and the ridiculous lines of contrived dialogue McDowell and Michelson are trying to feed us, they deserve nothing but the most flagrant ridicule.
Make no mistake that, in doing what they’ve done, they are not growing a game, but knowingly spreading a cancer.
