Golf-LIV seasons ends with Trump and eye-popping prize money

MIAMI : LIV Golf's tumultuous inaugural season concludes this week at Trump National Doral Golf Club where the eye-popping prize money and the former-president may well be the main attraction.

Controversy has hung over the Saudi-backed venture from the very start and will follow the series to Sunday's final round where the team champions will be crowned and a whopping $50 million paid out.

But keeping the focus on their marquee signings like former world number one Dustin Johnson and British Open champion Cameron Smith will again prove a challenge.

While LIV's feud with the PGA Tour continues to simmer, 9/11 Justice, an advocacy group comprised of family members and survivors of the attacks on the Twin Towers, plan to spoil the year-end extravaganza with a blunt television commercial on CNN protesting the Saudi-funded LIV Golf tournament.

The 9/11 community has long contended that Saudi government officials supported the hijackers in the attacks on the Twin Towers and labelled LIV golfers of being little more than well paid mercenaries in a "sportwashing" scheme by a nation trying to improve its reputation in the face of criticism over its human rights record.

Even at the season finale there was no escaping the controversy as a light-hearted, trash-talking press conference on Wednesday turned serious with questions over criticism from the PGA Tour's most vocal backer Rory McIlroy, who said in a Guardian interview that for "the first time in my life that I have felt betrayal, in a way".

Six-time major winner Phil Mickelson would not be drawn into a squabble with the world number one. He instead praised the Northern Irishman on his great season while warning critics they had better get used to having LIV Golf around because it