Sergio Garcia isn’t convinced about Rory McIlroy’s latest idea regarding the future of LIV Golf, despite the Northern Irishman seemingly softening his stance on the Saudi-backed tour of late.
In a wide-ranging interview with Sky Sport’s Stick to Football podcast earlier this month, McIlroy said he now accepts that there is a place for LIV in the professional game, adding that he would like the circuit to become like cricket’s Indian Premier League.
"What I would love LIV to turn into is almost like the Indian Premier League of golf. The IPL in cricket, they take two months during the calendar," McIlroy said.
"You have four weeks in May and four weeks in November, and you go and do this team stuff – it’s a bit different, and it’s a different format. If they were to do something like that, I think that sounds like fun – you’re at least working within the ecosystem."
However, Garcia – who is captain of LIV’s Fireballs GC team – was far from convinced about his former Ryder Cup teammate’s proposal.
"I don’t think we want to be important for one month," he said in an interview with The Standard. "We all deserve more than that.”
Garcia also spoke about his fellow Spaniard Jon Rahm’s big money move to LIV, saying it was a sign that the tour was here to stay.
“It shows we’re here to stay for a long time,” Garcia said. “People were thinking this is going to be two or three years and then gone. You’re seeing guys sign through to late 2020s and maybe even the 2030s.”
Rahm’s move has received little criticism from his peers, perhaps another sign of the increasing acceptance of LIV Golf’s place in the sport. McIlroy even called it a “smart business move”.
Meanwhile, many players have instead turned their anger towards the PGA Tour, with the likes of Viktor Hovland blaming Rahm’s exit on the “great deal of arrogance” from the tour’s leadership.
But Garcia also pointed to players like himself, who made the initial move to LIV, as a reason for the lack of outrage surrounding Rahm.
“[Rahm] should probably thank us a little bit for that – we knew being the first ones we would take some heat," Garcia said.
“We believed in the product, we believed in how good LIV is and it can become even better. We just had to ride the wave of criticism, but now people are starting to see the reality of it.”
