Amid suggestions that he should be removed from his position, Greg Norman’s role as CEO and commissioner of the LIV Golf League is actually being strengthened, meaning more autonomy in running the second-year circuit that announced its 2023 schedule and will begin play next month.
Sports Illustrated has learned that Majed Al-Sorour, the managing director of LIV Golf, will leave that role but continue as one of seven members of the LIV Golf board of directors. Al-Sorour is also CEO of the Saudi Golf Federation.
Al-Sorour’s role with LIV Golf is not being filled, meaning more power for Norman, 67, the two-time major-championship winner who is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame and whose leadership has been questioned by PGA Tour stars Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy.
The change for Norman and Al-Sorour was confirmed to SI by a LIV Golf official, with the expectation that more information and a statement will be released later Monday.
LIV Golf is also announcing its schedule, which will see a couple of alterations from previously released versions of the 14-tournament slate. As previously announced, the league will begin with its first tournament Feb. 24 at the Mayakoba Golf Resort in Mexico.
Related: See LIV Golf’s Full 2023 Schedule Here
The late additions to the schedule are a season-ending team event in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and the Boston event—where Dustin Johnson won in a playoff—being scrapped. There will also be a tournament the week prior to the Masters at Orange County National outside of Orlando.
What was supposed to be the season-ending team event at Doral in September will now move to October as a regular event, with the team championship to be played at Royal Greens Golf & Country Club in Saudi Arabia in early November.
With the schedule now released, the announcement last week of the TV deal with the CW Network, and the pending revelation of the 48-player field and 12-team lineups for 2023, Al-Sorour’s day-to-day duties were no longer necessary. He is already busy with other Saudi sports endeavors, such as the Newcastle United football club, WWE and his role with the country’s golf federation.
LIV Golf has already undergone a bit of a restructuring after Atul Khosla, the Chief Operating Officer, left LIV Golf in December. He was replaced by a trio of executives at Performance 54, a UK-based agency that has been with LIV Golf since it formed in 2021.
All report to Norman, whose direct contact now will be Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of the Public Investment Fund. The PIF is Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, said to be worth some $620 billion, and the funding source for LIV Golf.
Greg Norman and LIV Golf have finalized their 14-event schedule for 2023.
USA Today
If Woods and McIlroy had their way, Norman would have been removed. In recent months, both players said they could see the possibility of collaboration between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf if Norman were no longer part of the leadership.
“I think Greg needs to go,” said McIlroy, who also noted the litigation between the two parties would also need to end. “I think he just needs to exit stage left. He’s made his mark, but I think now is the right time to sort of say, look, you’ve got this thing off the ground, but no one is going to talk unless there’s an adult in the room that can actually try to mend fences.”
Woods, who along with McIlroy helped the PGA Tour come up with a plan that will see the top players better compensated this year through designated events with high purses, said similar things about Norman at the Hero World Challenge.
“I think Greg has to go, first of all, and then obviously litigation against us and then our countersuit against them, those would then have to be at a stay as well. So then we can talk, we can talk freely.”
Norman responded over the weekend on a Fox News segment in which he said Woods does not know all the facts “because obviously I’m still here” and that “he might be a bit of a mouthpiece for the PGA Tour to try and get us to create, to try and get turmoil created internally within LIV.”
Perhaps there was some turmoil as it related to the LIV Golf schedule, which at one point was supposed to be released in late November. Playing an event again in Saudi Arabia was not part of the original plan, nor was extending the season into November.
LIV had previously announced the Mayakoba event, along with one in Tucson, Arizona, in March and tournaments in Australia, Singapore, Spain, Oklahoma and West Virginia.
On Monday it announced a tournament the weekend prior to the Masters (March 31-April 2) at Orange County National outside of Orlando, as well as others in New Jersey, Washington, DC, London, Chicago, Miami and Jeddah.
Norman was named CEO and commissioner of LIV Golf in November of 2021. The winner of the 1986 and 1993 British Opens, Norman won 20 times on the PGA Tour and more than 60 other worldwide titles.
But he long had a contentious relationship with the PGA Tour over his ability to play where he wanted around the world without having to get permission in the former of a release. That is ultimately at the crux of the battle between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf.
2023 LIV Golf Schedule
February 24-26: El Camaleon Golf Club, Playa Del Carmen, Mexico
March 17-19: The Gallery Golf Club, Tucson, Arizona
March 31-April 2: Orange County National (Crooked Cat), Orlando, Florida
April 21-23: The Grange Golf Club, Adelaide, Australia
April 28-30: Sentosa Golf Club (Serapong Course), Singapore
May 12-14: Cedar Ridge Country Club, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma
May 26-28: Trump National Golf Club, Washington, DC
June 30-July 2: Real Club Valderrama, Sotogrande, Spain
July 7-9: Centurion Club, London, England
Aug. 4-6: The Old White Course, White Sulfur Springs, West Virginia
Aug. 11-13: Trump National Golf Club, Bedminster, New Jersey
September 22-24: Rich Harvest Farms, Sugar Grove, Illinois
October 20-22: Trump National Doral, Miami, Florida
Nov. 3-5: Royal Greens Golf & Country Club, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
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