I t’s not often that a multi-millionaire sports star is a pawn in a global power play, but that was the situation Rory McIlroy found himself in last week.
The Northern Irishman, currently ranked the third best golfer in the world, was having to explain how he felt after his long campaign to hold out against a disruptive Saudi Arabian competition had ended with the Gulf state sharing control over the entirety of his sport. “It’s hard for me to not sit up here and feel somewhat like a sacrificial lamb and feeling like I’ve put myself out there and this is what happens,” he said.
McIlroy had reportedly turned down hundreds of millions of pounds to join a global tournament paid for by the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF).
LIV Golf, as it was known, was a team-based competition that looked less like the traditional golfing world and more like a Las Vegas nightclub.