With a long-awaited ruling due, LIV players may be about to see their route to majors and the Ryder Cup vanish overnight.
David Puig’s recent win at the Australian PGA Championship wasn’t just the biggest moment of his young career – it also reignited one of golf’s most uncomfortable debates: how much longer can LIV players continue dipping into DP World Tour events when it suits them? And, more importantly, is that privilege about to disappear altogether?
Inside the DP World Tour, the feeling is that the clock is ticking. Several prominent European voices believe the long-running legal case that decides whether LIV players can keep DP World Tour membership is edging towards a decisive ruling – one that could reshape the futures of Jon Rahm, Tyrrell Hatton, Puig, and many others.
And the impact of that ruling goes far beyond entry to mid-level DP World Tour events. Playing on the DP World Tour gives LIV players World Ranking points, which helps them get into majors, and having DP World Tour membership is fundamental to their Ryder Cup eligibility. Lose that membership, and LIV players suddenly find themselves in a Ryder Cup no man’s land.
For someone like Rahm, who has made no secret of how much the Ryder Cup means to him, that’s a career-altering consequence.
Speaking on The Chipping Forecast podcast, broadcaster Andrew Cotter highlighted how open the door is for LIV players right now.
“As we know now, playing on LIV is very compatible with playing on the European Tour,” he said. “In fact, Puig has committed himself to full membership of the European Tour but also retained his LIV Golf contract for 2026.”
BBC golf correspondent Iain Carter believes that situation is fundamentally unfair.
“There is a fundamental inequality at the heart of this game,” he said. “The rank-and-file DP World Tour players can’t go and play on LIV. It’s not fair. It’s fundamentally not fair.
“Puig has played 10 events that count on the World Rankings; he is trying to force his way into a position where he can qualify for majors, while taking the money from a tour that really doesn’t give you enough of a route into those majors.”
Cotter agreed, calling it “a door that opens one way but not the other”.
DP World Tour player and podcast co-host Eddie Pepperell added that while he and his peers have tolerated the situation for longer than many expected they’d have to, patience is wearing thin – especially when LIV players get spots in limited-field European events.
“Players on the DP World Tour can put that aside for long enough. I think we have done now for a while,” he said, referencing the likes of LIV players Adrian Meronk, Tom McKibbin, and Victor Perez (who originally entered before withdrawing) all being eligible to tee it up in this week’s Nedbank Golf Challenge, despite its limited field and bumper prize pot.
Then came the real bombshell. Pepperell revealed that the long-discussed case that will define the future of the LIV Golf and DP World Tour crossover could finally be done and dusted next spring.
“By the end of April, it may be the case, from what I’ve heard, that the Tour will have some clarity on that,” he said. “If the ruling goes in the Tour’s favor, then these guys will very likely not be playing on the DP World Tour for much longer.”
And that has enormous implications for the Ryder Cup. If the ruling strips LIV players of their DP World Tour membership, their route into the team disappears overnight. No automatic qualifying. No captain’s picks. Nothing.
Realistically, there’s little chance that Team Europe would allow a scenario in which they can’t have Rahm and Hatton on the team, but it would take some very creative rejigging of their own rules to maintain their eligibility.
Puig’s win was his breakthrough moment, but in a few months’ time, it might be remembered as something else entirely: the last chapter before LIV players find themselves shut out of Europe – and shut out of the Ryder Cup.
