Cam Smith was crowned Champion Golfer of The Year at The Open just two years ago, but it appears the LIV Golf star still feels he has something to prove on the major stage.
Cam Smith has set his sights on winning more major titles, with the LIV Golf star admitting he is still keen to prove he can compete against some of the best golfers on the planet.
A little over two years ago, Smith became a major champion, clinching the 150th Open Championship at St Andrews after pipping Rory McIlroy to the Claret Jug. At the time the Australian was one the most in-form golfers on the planet, sitting No. 2 in the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR).
Just weeks later however, the Champion Golfer of The Year left the sport in shock, opting to leave the PGA Tour to sign for the then start-up league at LIV, signing a mega-money contract with fellow Australian Greg Norman.
Since then, Smith has failed to make his mark on the major stage, and has unsurprisingly drifted down the world rankings, with LIV continuing to host events without OWGR points on offer. Two years on from making the leap to the breakaway league, Smith is keen to show he can still compete at the very top.
”I want to show that I am still a great player and that I am capable of lifting all the major championships and the majors,” Smith said to Golf monthly. “I thought it was good that Brooks [Koepka] had to give one for the team at the PGA last year and that gave the first major to a LIV player.”
“Bryson [DeChambeau] carried that on as well [at the US Open],” added the former Open champion. ‘Maybe we can get into a bit of rhythm here in future and we can all chip away at a few more majors.’ Despite yet winning the famous green jacket, Smith’s record at the masters tournament is an excellent one.
In April, he had his most spirited major performance of the year at the Augusta National and ended the week at the tied sixth place to mark the fourth top-10 in his last five visists to this historic Georgia course. The LIV setup has also seen Smith maintain a rather decent form as well, but he has not been able to pull through to come up with other three individual wins that he recorded in both 2022 and 2023 season.
He has had success with his Ripper GC team however no more so than when playing in front of a home crowd at LIV Adelaide in April. Smith and his team came from the breakway circuit to get a shot at the playoff for the first time ever and they were not going to let it go to waste especially in front of the enthusiastic Australians.
Brilliant back-to-back wins came a week later in Singapore and Smith and co have an opportunity to clinch the biggest LIV prize of all at this weekend’s Team Championship. The all-Australian team will have a bit less games in the beginning of the week as they were qualified to the semi-final in this event after reaching third place in the points standings in the year which is behind Jon Rahm’s Legion XIII and Bryson DeChambeau’s Crushers GC.