New Delhi—The breakaway LIV series can do for golf what the IPL did for cricket, India’s top player Anirban Lahiri has said after joining the lucrative Saudi-backed tour.
The new circuit has sparked a bitter split that threatens to tear golf apart and sparked accusations of “sportswashing” of Saudi Arabia’s human rights record.
Saudi Arabia has drawn major criticsm over the 2018 murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and for cracking down on rights activists, many of whom have been jailed or banned from travel.
Despite that and the vast financial rewards being offered to lure players away from the more established US PGA and European tours, the defecting Lahiri said that LIV would benefit others along the way too.
Lahiri, runner-up at the Players Championship in March, was one of six new recruits—along with world number two Cameron Smith—announced on Tuesday for the LIV Golf Invitational Boston this week.
“I look at the Indian Premier League and T20. When it started, I remember the almost vehement opposition it received,” Lahiri told Wednesday’s Hindustan Times.
“But it had the potential of changing the way we consumed cricket.
“Look at it now. The Board of Control for Cricket in India is laughing all the way to the bank and so are the players. The broadcasters are delighted because they get off-the-chart ratings,” he said.
Lahiri said that he was a “big fan” of traditional, five-day Test cricket but that the shorter Twenty20 format that the IPL pioneered was “so much fun”.
“LIV can be the IPL of golf,” the 35-year-old world number 92 said.
Meanwhile, British Open champion Cameron Smith has become the latest leading player to sign up to the breakaway LIV Golf Series, which on Tuesday announced that he was in the field for its next event.
The Australian was one of six new recruits for the Saudi-backed tour for the LIV Golf Invitational Boston, from September 2-4.
As the world’s number two, the 29-year-old Smith will become the highest-ranked player to compete in a LIV Golf event.
Smith was linked repeatedly to LIV Golf shortly after winning the 150th British Open, at St Andrews, last month, but avoided discussion of the subject while playing in this month’s PGA FedEx Cup playoffs.
A LIV statement issued Tuesday said Smith would be among five other players making their debuts among a field of 48 at the International in Massachusetts, including compatriot Marc Leishman, leading Chilean golfer Joaquin Niemann, Harold Varner III (world no 46), Cameron Tringale (55) and India’s Lahiri (92).
LIV Golf’s record $25 million purses and 54-hole format have attracted several big-name players, including Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Sergio Garcia, Henrik Stenson, Lee Westwood, Ian Poulter, Patrick Reed, and Dustin Johnson.
Smith told Golf Digest on Tuesday that money “was definitely a factor” in his decision.
“I won’t ignore that or say that wasn’t a reason,” he said. “It was obviously a business decision for one and an offer I couldn’t ignore.