Saudi Arabia's PIF Boss Playing in DP World Tour Event With LIV Golfer and R&A CEO Martin Slumbers
Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the head of the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, is playing in this week’s Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland as a partner with LIV Golf League member Peter Uihlein.
He’ll also be grouped on Thursday, the opening day of the tournament, with R&A CEO Martin Slumbers, according to the Scotsman newspaper.
Al-Rumayyan, who is also chairman of the Newcastle United football club, was invited by tournament host Johann Rupert, a South African billionaire. He is listed under a pseudonym, Andrew Waterman.
Yasir Al-Rumayyan is an avid golfer and playing alongside LIV Golf's Peter Uihlein at the Dunhill Links Championship in Scotland.
Brian Spurlock/Icon Sportswire
"Sport is supposed to unite people, not divide,” Rupert, the chairman of Dunhill’s parent company Richemont and also chairman of the event’s championship committee, told The Scotsman. “We need to get peace.”
Al-Rumayyan is the main force behind LIV Golf and secretly negotiated a "framework agreement" with PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and two prominent board members earlier this spring that led to shocking announcement on June 6 that an alliance will be attempted.
There is a Dec. 31 deadline to complete a deal and few details have emerged other than the initial framework, which said a new company called PGA Tour Enterprises would be formed among the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and the PIF. Al-Rumayyan would be chairman of the board with Monahan serving as CEO.
Both the PGA Tour and LIV Golf are set to exist as is in 2024.
“It was suggested to me a while ago that I should extend an invitation to His Excellency, but I only got confirmation last week to say he would be playing,” Rupert said. “And, if I am asked by anyone what we will discuss, I will be saying it will be support for amateur golf worldwide.
“What is happening in golf just now is not growing the golf. It’s only making the top 100 players a lot wealthier. We have just launched the African Amateur Championship, for example, and we need support to expand the credibility of that.”
Slumbers, who at the British Open in July acknowledged the growing influence of the PIF in sports worldwide, said he’d have to be open to the idea of investment from the Saudi wealth fund, given the challenges of meeting ever-increasing demands.
He met with Al-Rumayyan during the Open at Royal Liverpool.
“If I'm very open, we are and do and continue to do, talk to various potential sponsors,” Slumbers said. “We have a number of large corporate partners that help us make this thing happen. I think the world has changed in the last year. It's not just golf. You're seeing it in football. You're seeing it in F1. You're seeing it in cricket. I'm sure tennis won't be that far behind.
“The world of sport has changed dramatically in the last 12 months, and it is not feasible for the R&A or golf to just ignore what is a societal change on a global basis. We will be considering within all the parameters that we look at all the options that we have.”
Along with Uihlein, three other LIV Golf members are in the Dunhill Links field: Louis Oosthuizen, Talor Gooch and Hudson Swafford. They were eligible because they either never were DP World Tour members or resigned membership before playing in a LIV event.