LIV Golf is set to make a blockbuster move in the boardroom, with Greg Norman set to be replaced as CEO in a move likely to appease those on the other side of golf’s civil war.
Greg Norman is set to be replaced as LIV Golf’s CEO, with the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund actively looking for a replacement for the Australian.
The two-time major championship winner, 69, has been the most vocal figure and ambassador for the controversial breakaway league since its formation in 2022, and he will stay within the company even after his replacement is hired. According to Sports Business Journal, Norman will simply be moved into another role as his replacement is sought.
The PIF has recruited a head hunting agency in London to look for a new CEO for the company and has been rejected by Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark. Today’s search for a new CEO takes place alongside continuous and protracted discussions between the PIF and the PGA Tour on a merger that – once concluded – will dramatically alter the golfing industry’s landscape.
Norman is, for all intents and purposes, the public face of the Saudi Arabia investment in the sport and was speaking recently about signing new players in the off-season with the help of the PIF’s uncapped resources.
But now, it seems he’ll take a step aside, as LIV looks to replace him as CEO as well as hiring a new chief revenue officer and chief logistics officer. It’s claimed by SBJ that Norman has sufficient support from within the LIV Golf organisation, and this move isn’t a demotion for the man who has been credited with the large portion of LIV’s success.
Despite his support from within LIV, Norman has still managed to rub people the wrong way on the other side of the aisle.
Rory McIlroy previously claimed: “I think Greg needs to go. I believe he simply has to go away, or as the professionals say, to step down from the scene. He’s established his dominance but I think now if it’s time to say you started this thing, this organization, but now no one’s going to be willing to speak until there’s an adult present here who at least is going to attempt to fix this.
Tiger Woods echoed McIlroy’s sentiments, saying: ‘I believe Greg has to disappear, first of all,’ Woods, 46, America’s troubled golf star whose life has been blighted by yellow:jacket controversies. “And then of course litigation against us and then our countersuit against them those would then indeed have to be at a stay as well.” Then we can talk, we can all talk and there will be no restrictions whatsoever.