MENA Tour chief hits back at OWGR over LIV Golf

The commissioner of the MENA Tour has slammed OWGR after it did not award ranking points for this week’s LIV Golf event.

LIV announced a “strategic alliance” with the developmental circuit earlier this week in a bid to circumvent the application process.

However, OWGR insisted changes to the tour, which had been mothballed since the Covid-19 pandemic, had not been made in time for points to be awarded this week.

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Now David Spencer, the tour’s commissioner, has claimed there was “no reason” for the event in Bangkok not to be accepted.

“We have had various communications with OWGR since submitting our 2022/23 schedule, MENA Tour handbook, exemption criteria and our field ahead of our opening event of our new season which tees off today,” he said in a statement on Thursday.

“None of this communication pointed towards any technical reason for the LIV Golf Invitational Bangkok to be treated any differently to any MENA Tour event, every one of which has received OWGR since we were accepted into the OWGR framework in 2016.

“We have followed the OWGR Guidelines for our 2022/23 season. Recently, there has been much talk in the golf world about limited field tournaments and 54-hole tournaments.

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“For absolute clarity, the OWGR itself defines a limited field tournament as a tournament which has less than 30 qualified players. Furthermore, the MENA Tour has always had the OWGR’s blessing to stage 54-hole tournaments.”

Spencer pledged to “work tirelessly to resolve this situation with the OWGR” and insisted the field for LIV’s next event in Jeddah will be submitted prior to the governing body’s deadline of October 12.

A document appearing to be the MENA Tour schedule has also been leaked online, which appears to confirm LIV events will be held in North Africa and Australia in 2023.