LIV Golf returns but 12-team format is nonsense and nobody cares

The second season of LIV Golf starts today in Mexico accompanied by a brand-new promotional campaign. The rebel disruptors are not trumpeting any of their big-name new signings – although since Thomas Pieters is the biggest maybe that is not surprising – or the prize fund bump to an eye-watering £325million or their expansion to 14 tournaments.

Instead they are pushing the most unfathomable aspect to the whole LIV phenomenon – the team contest which runs in harness with the individual events. The ‘12 Teams. You Choose’ video features a curious little girl who poses the question: ‘Hey mister, why should I support your team?’ to the captains of all the line-ups. Why indeed.

How to split one bunch of middle-aged millionaires from another in your affections – it’s not easy. Sergio Garcia attempts to differentiate for her. ‘Fireballs – We’re the most passionate, best-looking guys in the league.’

Ian Poulter tries to sway her with a trademark rap of his chest: ‘Majesticks – it’s the badge that everyone wants to wear.’ And so on and so on until we have covered the desperately-named dozen. She hedges her bets – ‘OK, let me think about it.’ ‘Think about what,’ says Phil Mickelson (of the HiFlyers), as if the decision is obvious. Which it is.

Ignore the lot of them and put a poster of Coco Gauff or Eileen Gu on your wall, little lady. Listen to Peter Uihlein babbling about the 4Aces being LIV’s version of the New York Yankees and it is clear how hard a sell the whole team concept is being given.

The comparison is patent nonsense of course. They may have won £13m for taking the team title in LIV’s debut year in 2022 but unlike the Yankees, no-one cares about the 4Aces. No-one cares about any of the teams.

Which is a shame for LIV’s Saudi backers. The assumption when they, or their desert neighbours, involve themselves in any sport is that money is no object. Call it nation projection or plain old sportswashing, spending is a distant second in importance to impact.

That is certainly the take on LIV Golf. It isn’t entirely accurate though. Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund is not simply a hosepipe of cash blasting notes willy-nilly across the fairways. It has its eye on some form of long-term return and LIV’s teams are supposed to be a key component of that.

In the same way as cricket in India created hugely valuable franchises from scratch via the IPL, LIV is hoping to work the same magic in golf. Team golf can be fantastic – the Ryder Cup and Solheim Cup, both of which will be contested in Europe in September, bring outstanding drama.

But they succeed though because there is something tangible to pin your colours to. Americans are Americans, Europeans – whether from the continent or our detached islands – are Europeans. The players buy in; we buy in.

Team golf with mercenary players representing wholly artificial constructs exerts no pull whatsoever. There has been a huge misjudgment here. Franchise sport will always exert weaker forces of attraction than pure club or international competition but it can be made to work with the right anchors.

The IPL franchises have done so because their roots, shallow though they are, lie in vast Indian cities and regions. Commercial inventions or not, the Mumbai Indians and the Delhi Capitals have an identity. Tournament golf, an essentially individual, geographically transient pursuit, has none of those anchors.

Range Goats, Ripper and the rest are expensively-decorated circus wagons moving rootlessly from country club to country club. They are utterly vacuous creations. LIV may have the finance behind it to buy a place at golf’s top table but all the money in the world would not make the team idea stick.