Justin Rose finds problem with Billy Horschel plan as LIV Golf stance becomes clear
Justin Rose and Billy Horschel can't see eye to eye when it comes to LIV Golf and the PGA Tour merging together, as negotiations continue into a potential deal
by Abbie Meehan · The MirrorJustin Rose admits that he "can't quite see" the PGA Tour and LIV Golf merging together in the future - but Billy Horschel has a more positive outlook.
Negotiations have continued into the merger deal between the two golfing organisations, alongside the DP World Tour as well, with discussions ongoing into the perfect legal deal and the possibility for LIV golfers to take part in PGA Tour events.
The latest progress reports have been slow, with DP World Tour athlete Rose convinced that the merger wouldn't be possible due to the golfing schedule being so hectic. The 11-time PGA Tour winner has suggested that he was not surprised by the invention of LIV Golf back in 2021, given how many tournaments were showing up on golfer's calendars.
Speaking ahead of the BMW PGA Championship last month, the 44-year-old said: "I think that's why we're in the predicament that we're in, because historically, or even if you looked at the PGA Tour a while back, I don't know how many tournaments, I'm going to say 45, but there were a lot of tournaments, and obviously the top players have seemed to only want to play 20 to 25 it times a year tops, 22 probably seems to be the magic number. Majors plus 18.
"I think that's why there was an opportunity for someone, a tour, a league to kind of have the concept, at least hypothetically, that the top players want to play X amount of times together, and that's why we are where we are."
He added: "That's been a very hard thing to figure out, obviously, because we have different nationalities, different tours, how do you all kind of get into that position? That's why I can't quite see what the future is in terms of us coming back together because I think you're still limited to the fact that there's only a certain amount of weeks that the top players want to play.
"So you can create this league, that league, this tour, supplement with this, but if it accumulates to 30 tournaments, you're still going to get players choosing, no matter how much money you put up, not to play."
However, one golfer that is adamant that things may well swing in the way of the merger is American athlete Horschel. The 37-year-old, who teed off on Thursday alongside Rose at the Open de France in Paris, held some bitter thoughts at the beginning of the LIV Golf debacle.
At the Scottish Open in 2022, Horschel claimed that those who had moved from one tour to another were "hypocrites" and had "made their bed" when decided to head to the Saudi-backed tour. Since these comments were made, the American has now admitted that while he did hold a grudge over the move, he believes the deal could very well be done.
He said: "Time allows things to dissipate. We’ve seen that through the history. I’m sure there’s people that still hold grudges and everything. Personally I still hold a few grudges, I’m not going to lie. But I understand that for things to get better and heal, you have to get past that and move beyond that.
"Personally, I’ve moved on beyond that, but I know some guys, some players probably still hold grudges, but I think we do need to move beyond that to really come together.
"I do believe that there’s been both goodwill on both sides to try to make a deal happen over the last 18 months, year, since the agreement. It may not move as quickly as people want. There’s a lot of complicated things to figure out and there’s a lot of things behind the scenes that the public just don’t understand. That they can’t comment on.
“Hopefully, the fans understand by this pairing [Monahan/Al Rumayyan], these groupings that things are moving in the right direction.
"I do believe now looking at the game of golf, which I could never imagine at that point [2022] sitting there and speaking how I spoke, that the divide that we’ve created in the game of golf would create such a disinterest in the fans. And that’s really who has sort of been hurt by all this.
"I do believe the majority of players on the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour, the players that play on LIV, I think we want to figure out some way that we can all make this work."
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