Richard Sullivan: Morals left swinging as golf decides to LIV it up
LIV golfer and multi-national major winner Phil Mickelson, when asked about the Saudi state murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi remarked: “Everybody makes mistakes.”
Phil Mickelson
Money talks, as the saying goes, but it’s the unspoken words that are the most meaningful.
There was a glaring omission recently when the masters of the PGA golf tour announced they were welcoming the rats into the tent.
All the talk was about money, money, money – the mind-boggling hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars Saudi Arabia is spending so that sports administrators here can buy a very expensive pair of blinkers.
The Saudi-sponsored LIV tour is now in partnership with the PGA and the DP World Tour to “maximise’’ commercial opportunities – disgusting.
PGA chief Jay Monahan once spoke about the slaughter of the near 3,000 people at the World Trade Center at the hands of Saudi nationals as a reason why he would never do business with the breakaway LIV tour.
He said the relatives of those taken would never forgive him – well they won’t now, 12 months after those hollow patriotic words he climbed into bed with the Saudis.
Last week, nobody mentioned the Saudi state murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi – dismembered while still alive when he arrived at the Saudi embassy in Turkey.
A murder believed to have been sanctioned by Mohammed bin Salman, chair of the Public Investment Fund which is backing the LIV golf tour – now partners to PGA.
LIV golfer and multi-national major winner Phil Mickelson – with his dollar goggles firmly in place – when asked about Khashoggi remarked: “Everybody makes mistakes.”
Nobody mentioned the public floggings, mutilations and executions, the persecution of gay and transgender people and the enslavement of migrant workers.
Boxing has sold its soul, WWE has sold its soul, now the great game of golf has joined the witches’ coven.
Word is, tennis is next.
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The term is ‘sports washing’ – broadly speaking, it’s using sport to improve a country’s reputation and draw a veil over your vile conduct.
Footballers such as Ronaldo and Benzema have taken the soiled dollars of Riyadh, and more will follow.
Sport has forever been intertwined with politics – people keep saying the two can’t mix, which is errant nonsense.
From the 1936 Olympics when Hitler put his Aryan supremacy on show, to the Black Power display at the 1968 games, to the apartheid regime using rugby to paper over their abuses – the two have been inextricably linked.
And now we have the Qatari ruling family set to add Man Utd to their list of assets. Nobody mentions their partnership with Saudi Arabia and their bombardment and blockade of Yemen, which has placed more than 20.7 million people at risk of starvation.
They join Newcastle in toasting their Gulf masters.
Sport is becoming a very unpalatable business, but as I said money talks.
