Multiple major champ reveals LIV Golf approach

A crowd of more than 90,000 people descended on The Grange Golf Club near Adelaide as Talor Gooch won the fourth event of the LIV Golf season.

Had things turned out differently, Padraig Harrington could have been part of the action.

During an appearance on The Late, Late Show in Ireland this weekend, the three-time major champion revealed that he rejected an informal approach to join the Saudi-funded golf league.

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“I got a text message [about joining] but I didn’t want the temptation,” said the former Ryder Cup captain. “If somebody comes around and offers you a hundred million, five hundred million, that’s a lot of temptation. It’s a lot of temptation and I didn’t want it. Sometimes you just don’t need it.

“I’m not going but I’ve lots of friends who go and they’re still my friends. I can see why people would go and I can see the good of it in terms of inclusion if things change.

“Some of the guys have gone for free, but there’s a lot of prize money. Whether they should go or not is up to the individuals. Some of the guys who’ve gone wouldn’t have been in good financial situations.”

LIV has been widely criticised for its links to Saudi Arabia amid the regime’s dire human rights record. Harrington, however, believes that it has the potential to help cultivate change.

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“I wouldn’t want to live in Saudi Arabia as it is now, but I do believe inclusion changes things,” he said. “The more international inclusion of Saudi Arabia, the more the people will go, ‘You know what – we want to change things.’

“It’s not that long ago here we used to put pregnant women in mother and baby homes; 1996 was when the last of them closed so we’re not that far away from it.”