Stenson and Reed share LIV Golf lead amid strange Bedminster scenes

Shortly after the three-man paratrooper unit of former US Navy Seals carrying a jumbo-sized American flag touched down amid the screaming guitars of AC/DC’s Thunderstruck at ear-splitting volumes, Phil Mickelson was interrupted by a heckler as he stood over his first shot on the 16th tee.

“Do it for the Saudi royal family!”

Talk about awkward. The six-time major champion stepped away from his ball, composed himself as the gallery stirred before depositing his tee shot into a greenside bunker. And it only got stranger from there on a muggy, overcast Friday afternoon as the third event of the controversial LIV Golf Invitational Series creaked to life at Trump National Golf Club in the central New Jersey farm town of Bedminster.

Henrik Stenson and Patrick Reed were the joint overnight leaders at seven-under-par through 18 holes, two shots ahead of Thailand’s Phachara Khongwatmai and three better than Dustin Johnson and Carlos Ortiz. But the golf itself at the $25m Saudi-backed event continues to take a back seat to the ample controversy outside the ropes.

The steady backlash from critics who have accused the Saudi government of using their reported $2bn investment to sanitize the kingdom’s dismal human rights record, severe repression of women’s and LGBTQ+ rights and the 2018 murder of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi has been well-documented since the breakaway golf tour was formally announced in March. Same for its alleged ties to the September 11 attacks, which prompted a large protest on Friday morning led by survivors and victims’ families at the public library four miles down the road from the 500-acre grounds of Trump National. (That the former US president continues to plaster the presidential seal all over