Aussie superstar Cameron Smith’s LIV Golf team gets a new – and VERY Aussie – name as fans have a field day with the American team changing their tag to the RangeGoats
- Cameron Smith calls his LIV Golf team ‘Ripper GC’
- Fellow Aussies Marc Leishman and Matt Jones are part of the squad
- LIV Golf will introduce a new look 14-tournament league this year
- Tensions continue with PGA Tour, LIV makes ‘zero revenue’ in 2022
Cameron Smith has announced the name for the LIV Golf team he will captain ahead of the coming season – and it has a distinctly Aussie flavour.
Smith, 29, calls his squad – which features countrymen Marc Leishman and Matt Jones – ‘Ripper GC.’
The 2022 Open Championship winner defected to LIV Golf last year for a reported $140million – and the affable Queenslander was also given a 25 per cent stake in the all-Australian team by CEO Greg Norman.
In total, 12 teams will participate, with the choice of Bubba Watson’s name raising many eyebrows.
The 44-year-old – who won the Masters in 2012 and 2014 – chose the RangeGoats, which drew a lot of criticism on social media.
‘It’s worse than I thought. As a fan, very sad to see,’ tweeted one confused supporter.
Cameron Smith has announced the name for his LIV Golf team ahead of the coming season – and it has a distinctly Aussie flavor
Rival captain and two-time Masters champion Bubba Watson chose to call his US team the RangeGoats
Another said: ‘This made me laugh for two minutes straight. This is unrealistic. Really thought it was a joke.’
Meanwhile, despite shelling out nearly a billion dollars from Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund to start the breakaway league, LIV’s revenue was ‘almost zero’ in its first season, it has emerged.
Determined not to roll over, LIV Golf is going after the PGA.
‘The (PGA) tour has damaged LIV’s brand, inflated its costs by hundreds of millions of dollars and reduced revenues to almost zero,’ a document filed in court from LIV Golf’s lawyers revealed.
They also accused the PGA of ruining the careers of some of the circuit’s players, including Aussie journeyman Matt Jones.
Sydney-based Jones, 42, is one of several players suspended by PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan after participating in LIV Golf events last year without a formal release.
The LIV Golf League—which moved from an eight-event invitational series in 2022 to a 14-tournament league this year—will begin Feb. 24 in Mexico.
