Rory McIlroy’s playing partners at this week’s Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland will include the two men centrally involved in the negotiations aimed at ending the split in top-level men’s professional golf.
McIlroy, competing with father Gerry in the pro-am event, will play on Friday at Kingsbarns alongside PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, who is paired with Billy Horschel this week.
World number three McIlroy will then tee up with the boss of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) Yasir Al-Rumayyan and South African LIV golf player Dean Burmester at St Andrews on Saturday.
Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund underwrites the 48-competitor LIV Golf league which has signed up many of the world’s best players over the last three years including Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, Cameron Smith and Dustin Johnson.
Monahan and Al-Rumayyan will be in the same fourball along with their professionals on Thursday’s day one when they tee off at Carnoustie.
On Thursday, the McIlroys will play alongside Dunhill chief Johann Rupert, who has spoken of a “need to get peace” in the sport and invited Al-Rumayyan to play in this week’s event.
The PGA Tour commissioner and PIF boss were the architects of the widely-publicised framework agreement in June 2023 which ended litigation between the parties and was aimed at healing the fracture in the sport.
To date the negotiations which followed have not been concluded as both tours continue to operate in different orbits.
In the early days of LIV Golf, McIlroy was outspoken in his criticism of the rival tour but his stance has changed to him now being in favour of an accommodation being reached to heal the split in men’s golf.
Prior to last month’s Irish Open, McIlroy said that he was optimistic that an agreement would be reached.
“I think everyone in the game would love there to be one [a resolution],” McIlroy told BBC Sport NI.
“I’m hopeful and hopefully we’ll be hear some good news in the foreseeable future where things start to come back together.”
