Talor Gooch doubles down on controversial Rory McIlroy 'asterisk' claim

LIV champion Talor Gooch has defended his controversial comments about Rory McIlroy's potential career grand slam at The Masters.

Earlier, he had claimed a McIlroy victory at Augusta National would be marked with an asterisk due to the absence of LIV players he believes should be eligible. Now he is doubling down on his claim. Speaking on the Flushing It Golf podcast, Gooch said winning a Major during this period would be "noteworthy" because of the missing LIV players. Despite not being eligible for any Majors in 2024, Gooch feels the quality of the 54-man LIV Golf field two years after its start deserves more recognition during this time of "instability".

He said: "Winning a major in spite of the field probably not being what it was intended to be based on the qualifications that were set in place a while back, winning a major is still an incredible feat and it's not taking away the accomplishment that is, but I think what more so I meant was it's going to go down in history whenever all of this gets figured out.

"When you look at the names that I think most people at our level believe are some of the best in the world and they're not in that field, it's going to be noteworthy, and again, it doesn't take away from the accomplishment, but it is noteworthy.

"If you think about it furthermore, with three of the new additions to LIV this year, of the 12 guys (13 LIV players who have qualified for the Masters), if it wasn't for the off-season signings, there would be nine guys that would be playing in the field, with adding Adrian (Meronk) and Jon Rahm and Tyrrell (Hatton).

"I think the talk of LIV and the depth of the field and the quality of golf, it's much different now than it was two years ago and it's just going to