Retaining key LIV players an 'achievable hurdle' for new investors

LONDON, Oct 7 : LIV Golf faces a challenge to retain key players as the professional men's league restructures under Chapter 11 protection but it is a 'very achievable hurdle in a short period of time", the head of new investors BC Partners Credit said on Wednesday.

With financial backing from Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF) drying up, LIV last month started a court-supervised restructuring process that it hopes to complete in early 2027.

BC Partners Credit announced on Monday an initial committed investment and said it planned to provide up to $300 million in financing.

Ted Goldthorpe, partner and head of BC Partners Credit, told the Leaders Week London sports business conference that he saw LIV as a great opportunity.

"Every layer of the onion that we peel back on this thing, the more excited we are about the investment," he said.

"The thing that's really fun about this one is in all of our other leagues, the players are on the other side of the table. In this situation, the players are our partners. The players own the teams with us... you're 100 per cent aligned with the talent. That is really rare in sports."

LIV Golf launched in 2022 and lured leading players from the PGA Tour with lucrative contracts. The next phase envisages players becoming equity owners of both the league and its teams.

Several of those stars, including Jon Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Dustin Johnson and Cameron Smith, are listed in the Chapter 11 filing as creditors still owed millions in unsecured claims.

"If we can show people that this is a sustainable business and league, those teams have tonnes of value. My guess is, over time, this will begin to look a lot more like Formula One or other leagues that are analogous to what we're trying to