Matt Fitzpatrick says it’s a disgrace that PGA Tour stars were handed spots in the BMW PGA Championship.
Europe’s Ryder Cup hero believes the DP World Tour made a mistake in their tie-up and that football-style promotion and relegation is his dream conclusion to golf‘s civil war. Fitzpatrick is back to defend his Alfred Dunhill Links title in Scotland. However, the English ace gave his thoughts of the current state of the game during his eve-of-tournament address.
Fitzpatrick, who stated this is the worst year of his golfing career, gave his opinion on the recent Wentworth entry and said: “I don’t think the Tour should have gone with the PGA Tour. I was pretty livid, to be honest, at Wentworth when I found out that there was a handful of PGA Tour players coming to play and, at that point in time, not every person who kept their card last year got in the field, which I think is a disgrace. That’s the Flagship Event. There’s no invites given to European Tour players at THE PLAYERS Championship. So why are we dishing them out for Wentworth? I thought that was absolutely absurd.”
Fitzpatrick gave a broader assessment on the future as he also said: “I think in terms of bringing the game together this week, I’m past the point of caring. I just don’t care. Me saying things to the PGA Tour board, to the DP World Tour board, it’s not going to change, so why am I going to waste my time talking about it.”
On his own thoughts, Fitzpatrick continued: “My idea would be you have basically like a Premier League, Championship, league of golf, whether LIV is the Premier League or PGA Tour is the Premier League, whatever it is, and then you can bring everyone together. And there’s more of a relegation-promotion, you can work your way up. If everyone was together, I feel like that would be more beneficial, anyway. As a big football fan, there’s got to be more stories in the regulation-promotion rather than what I think there is now.”
Fitzpatrick savours his returns to Europe and added: “Now I’m sat here as now mainly a PGA Tour nowadays, which people probably say, well, you don’t come back and play anyway. I understand that, but there’s not really any option.
“If you want to achieve the things that you want to achieve in the game, you’ve got to play against the best players, here the best World Ranking points are, and unfortunately with that, the money follows that.
“If you want to be the best player you’re going to be, that’s the way you’re going to go. I do love living in the States. I’d have to sit and think about it. I love playing this, the Swiss, The Italian Open. There’s a bunch of events I love playing particularly compared to playing some of the PGA TOUR events we play. However, I love my life over in the States, and what’s going to be easiest for my family.
“I understand that Rory really likes it being in the UK. Is that something that makes it easier for him to play on a World tour? May be. But the Americans are probably going to be sat in America playing golf and that’s also fine. I think the game of golf is very individual, and you’ve got to be selfish.”
On his own 2024, Fitzpatrick said: “Really poor. Not what I wanted to achieve at all. It’s been the hardest year of my career by a mile. It’s been my worst year on the golf course for sure, results-wise.”