LIV’s $40m team finale likely canceled, says ‘disappointed’ captain

Martin Kaymer, captain of LIV Golf’s Cleeks team, told reporters on Wednesday that it is “highly unlikely” the circuit will stage its August team finale in Michigan.

The news was first reported by Ben Parsons of Today’s Golfer, who spoke with a “disappointed” Kaymer ahead of this week’s LIV Golf UK event.

It comes as the embattled league seeks to secure funding for next season following the withdrawal of Saudi support earlier this season.

Kaymer said that he expects the next three LIV events — this week in England and subsequent events in New Jersey and Indianapolis — will go ahead as scheduled, but barring a sudden change, the team finale in Michigan, scheduled for the Cardinal at Saint John’s in Plymouth, Mich., won’t happen. (He put the chances at five percent.) An earlier event scheduled for New Orleans was postponed indefinitely.

One quote from Kaymer sticks out from the report. He was processing the idea of the team event potentially moving up a week, to Indianapolis, and wound up reflecting on LIV’s year.

“On the other hand, how do you want to have a team winning the whole season if you don’t have a team event? We need to be honest. The whole season was a bit of a …,” he told TG. “There was so much happening. Canceled New Orleans. Canceled most likely the last event. So I think it’s important to just finish the season and hopefully we’ll have a plan for 2027.”

Kaymer added that he hasn’t given up on the league’s future; he echoed fellow captains’ hopes that they can “hit the reset button” for a scaled-back version of LIV going forward; CEO Scott O’Neil hopes to secure funding by September. Lee Westwood and Ian Poulter said this week that they’d helped connect the league with potential investors, while Jon Rahm said the league was keeping him informed but didn’t have specific assurances about its future.

“I’m not going to share anything that I can’t share with you guys right now,” he said, asked whether he expects to play LIV next season.

The Michigan news comes on the heels of the Asian Tour exiting its agreement with LIV in favor of a partnership with the DP World and PGA Tours, which was announced Tuesday.

You can read more from Kaymer here.

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