Exclusive: Asian Tour chief opens up on LIV deal and new rivalry

Cho Minn Thant has suddenly emerged as one of the key powerbrokers in men’s professional golf. 

Just a few short years ago, the Australian-born Asian Tour commissioner was fighting to keep his circuit afloat in the turmoil of a global pandemic that left them in financial ruin.

Now, with the injection of millions via a ten-year partnership with the Saudi backers of LIV Golf, his once-forgotten tour is becoming a big player in the sport’s ensuing chess game.

To discuss what the future holds, we sat down with Cho at the season-ending PIF Saudi International in Riyadh…

—

It’s obviously been a rollercoaster two years or so. Where does the Asian Tour now sit in the pecking order of the global tours?

We’re the third biggest conventional tour. You’ve got the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and us. Obviously our partners LIV add another layer of complexity to it all. I’d like to think that our prize money, number of tournaments and the calibre of tour is right up there now. I feel like we’ve eclipsed the Japan Tour which was higher than us not too long ago. We’ve gone up at least one rung in the last three or four years.

• Richard Bland blasts tour over ‘worst possible mistake’

• Bubba Watson: Why I’d quit playing LIV for Rory McIlroy

The deal to work with the Public Investment Fund and partner with LIV has been game-changing, right?

It’s accelerated our growth and got us in the public eye. When they talk about LIV, they talk about the International Series and the Asian Tour being a big part of that. It’s helped get us into people’s minds rather than being – I wouldn’t say forgotten about – but we’re so far away from the mainstream west that sometimes we’re not mentioned in the same breath. But now we are.

Our focus has always mainly been Asia. We’ve always had good membership and good sponsors in Asian events. Through Covid, it was just about surviving and being around for many years to come rather than becoming a development tour. I wouldn’t say right place, right time, because we’ve made some crucial decisions that got us to where we are now. But I’m happy with the way things have turned out so far.

You just announced a new 2025 event in India at the DLF Golf Club, a course that held the Indian Open on the DP World Tour. Is that a sign you’re starting to compete with them?

Two or three years ago, when all the turbulence started, people had to take sides. Whether it be golf courses, sponsors, the general public. I felt like they thought that they needed to pull for one side or another. Now it seems like, with DLF being a great example, that a company, golf course and sponsor can work with both sides because it works for them. Rolex, our greatest partner, work with all the tours. They do what suits them. It’s good to see companies to what they want to do.

What was that fallow period like?

It was tough because the market slowed down for us dramatically. Anyone that was associated with the PGA Tour and DP World Tour wouldn’t work with us because we’re associated with LIV. Now the doors have opened again, it’s really positive. Everyone was apprehensive about the International Series. We’ve now got presenting sponsors in Macau and India. We’ve got leads for new sponsors in new destinations around Asia as well. In the first two years with us and LIV, we were underwriting the International Series events. Now, they’ve got legitimate sponsors and tournament partners.

Four or five years ago, we were the smaller brother to the DP World Tour. We co-sanctioned five or six events. We had smaller prize purse events like the national opens that were $500,000. Now, with the International Series being $2m minimum, a lot of our regular events have upgraded and competition has been really good. It’s made us more global. There’s a lot more attention from places outside of Asia now when we used to have to cater for just South Asian and some North Asian countries, now we’re in the Middle East. We’ve had a tournament in Europe, Morocco coming back onto the schedule. The territory we work out of is a lot bigger now.

What is your relationship like with the other chief executives like Guy Kinnings and Jay Monahan? 

The medium level tours, we have a great relationship. The DP World Tour, I’m still in contact with Guy and speak regularly. We don’t have a lot of business but we compare schedules and try not to clash big events in the same region. That’s not good for anyone. The PGA Tour, there is less contact but we don’t have that much business with the PGA Tour now anyways. We used to be part of the World Golf Championships but we don’t have those anymore so the contact is limited with them.

Some players I’m speaking with here are saying the DP World Tour should ditch its alliance with PGA Tour and create a worldwide circuit with the Asian Tour and LIV, funded by the PIF. Could you see that happening?

Well, this week is a great example of it. We have exemption categories in this field for top players from around the world, the best LIV players. Our membership is diversifying. If we can have two, three, four more events like these a year, that would be massive. The world golf rankings available are high this week.

Justin Rose failed to get a release from the DP World Tour when he played in the Hong Kong Open recently. Can you collaborate properly when players are still being sanctioned for playing across both tours?

It remains to be seen what happens with the player releases. There are a lot of dual members of the Asian Tour and the DP World Tour who weren’t released to come and play the events they wanted to. That was quite harsh over the past two years. A good example was Shubhankar Sharma who tried to keep his card in Europe but wanted to come back and play the Asian Tour. He couldn’t get releases and couldn’t get status.

We’ve all got minimum requirements on tour. If you fulfil those then you should be able to do what you want on the other weeks in my opinion. We don’t have a strict release policy. If our players want to go play somewhere else, they can. They don’t get their eight, they don’t count on the final order of merit. It’s pretty simple. If you have a DP World Tour card and you play the Asian Tour, you can play a 30-event season pretty well.

• Tony Finau finally breaks silence on LIV rumours

• Koepka has dig at McIlroy ahead of PGA Tour-LIV ‘grudge match’

So if the Asian Tour doesn’t join forces with the DP World Tour, can it eventually be a serious rival?

I think so. In terms of the talent of players, we’re almost there. In terms of corporate support, we’re a little way off. We’d still like to see the Asian nations originally grow their tournaments and national opens. But there’s no reason why America couldn’t be a region, Europe a region and Pan Asia – which includes Australia, Korea, Japan, India – be another giant tour.

We work with so many countries, which is a blessing and a curse. We have to work with so many different cultures and governments. So while our footprint is quite broad, it’s also very difficult to work in that type of environment being in a different country every week. Whereas in America, you’re in the same country every week.

A harder job than Jay Monahan’s then?

Sometimes!

As someone promoting golf around the world, is the PGA Tour too insular?

I think that’s where the best players in the world naturally gravitate. It would be good to see the top players travel more and that’s what LIV does. It brings the top players to Australia, Asia and the Middle East. It was a shame that the World Golf Championships went the way that they did. I thought they were really good for the game. If we could add more WGC-style events that would be good for every tour.

The International Series is one of only two direct pathways into LIV. Does it frustrate you that if a contracted LIV player wins, there won’t be a spot on the league for one of your players?

We discussed it at the start of the year. We knew it was a possibility. But for our guys, you have ten pops at the cherry with the IS events. In defence of Peter Uihlein, he’s played seven times on the Asian Tour and actually joined late. He’s on top of the IS rankings but he’s in the top 65 on the Asian Tour. Even though he’s got a LIV contract, he’s played enough, I think fair and square. Disappointing that maybe they don’t drop it to the first available player who doesn’t have a contract but that was calculated at the start of the season.

Hopefully in the future we look at that and perhaps get even more than one spot. It’s always evolving. It depends on the LIV team structure. There’s no reason why the LIV captains who have spots on their team can’t pick guys off the IS rankings.

This week’s event carries two-and-a-half times as many points as a regular International Series event. Surely there’s a fine line between building drama with a LIV spot up for grabs and rewarding consistency on your tour?

In the future, we have to look at a minimum number of events. Maybe you have to play at least four IS events to count. That wasn’t put in place this year and maybe that was an oversight. Having said that, Peter would have made that number anyway.

Finally, can you give us some clues on what to expect in 2025?

We’re working on the International Series first and will announce the full Asian Tour schedule next week. At this point, we’re not looking at going back to the UK but destinations like Morocco, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Saudi. We’re making some returns to places like the Philippines. Hopefully Cambodia and Vietnam as well.

Ben Parsons joined bunkered as a Content Producer in 2023 and is the man to come to for all of the latest news, across both the professional and amateur games. Formerly of The Mirror and Press Association, he is a member at Halifax Golf Club and is a long-suffering fan of both Manchester United and the Wales rugby team.