Tiger Woods expected to make TGL debut on Jan 14

PALM BEACH – After a one-year delay, the Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy-backed TGL is set to make its debut on Jan 7.

Woods is expected to make his TGL debut on Jan 14, the new tech-infused indoor team golf league announced on Oct 21, along with the full schedule for its inaugural season that will be held entirely in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

The 15-time Major champion’s first potential match will come in the second week of the season inside a venue that fits 1,500 fans wrapped around a field of play featuring a five-storey-high simulator screen and an adjustable putting surface.

The 48-year-old Woods, who had back surgery in September and played a limited schedule in recent years due to injuries, is a part owner of Jupiter Links Golf Club, a team featuring himself, Max Homa, Tom Kim and Kevin Kisner.

Jupiter Links will face the Los Angeles Golf Club team made up of Collin Morikawa, Sahith Theegala, Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose in their first match.

Before every TGL match, teams will name three players each to compete in 15-hole contests that will feature two sessions: nine holes of three-man alternate shots followed by six holes of singles head-to-head play.

The opening TGL match on Jan 7 will feature a New York Golf Club team – made up of Xander Schauffele, Matt Fitzpatrick, Rickie Fowler and Cameron Young – against The Bay Golf Club unit of Ludvig Aberg, Wyndham Clark, Min Woo Lee and Shane Lowry.

TGL, a prime-time golf league featuring six squads of four players competing in a fast-paced form of team golf, was founded in 2022 by Woods and McIlroy's TMRW Sports in partnership with the PGA Tour.

Northern Irishman McIlroy is part of Boston Common Golf with Keegan Bradley, Adam Scott and Hideki Matsuyama and their first match is scheduled for Jan 27 against Woods’ Jupiter Links.

Golfers will tee off from real grass tee boxes to play custom-designed, virtual holes that will be projected on a massive screen. Once teams are inside approximately 50 yards, they will transition to live action and finish each hole on a short-game complex that transforms between holes.

Technology will help to make each hole unique and includes a 41-yard-wide turntable that rotates the green and bunkers to change approach angles, while motorised actuators embedded under the putting surface can morph its topography.

Two months before its initial January 2024 launch date, a power outage caused deflation and damage to the air-supported dome section of the TGL venue. Organisers have since replaced it with a steel-supported structure.

Meanwhile, Schauffele said on Oct 21 that winning at the Oct 24-27 Zozo Championship in Japan would be the “cherry on top” of a breakthrough year that saw him win two Majors.

Once known as golf’s nearly man, Schauffele triumphed at the PGA Championship in May before winning the British Open two months later at Royal Troon.

The 30-year-old American will be competing at the PGA Tour’s Zozo Championships in Japan, the country where his Taiwanese mother was brought up and where he still has extended family.

He has already tasted success in Japan, winning a pandemic-delayed Tokyo Olympic gold in 2021, and said he was looking forward to playing in front of his relatives at the par-70 Narashino Country Club.

“It would be a cherry on top. A lot of my family will be out and my grandparents will be out,” he said.

“To be able to win, I don’t get to see them very often. Delivering the gold medal to them was really special during that Covid year. Another win in front of them and for them would be even more special.”

Schauffele will face competition from a field that includes defending champion Morikawa and Japan’s Olympic bronze medallist Matsuyama.

Schauffele helped the United States beat the Internationals at the Presidents Cup in Montreal in September.

He said 2024 has been “a dream come true” so far, adding: “Winning two Majors in a season, you dream of that stuff.

“For me to be able to do it is very special. I will always remember 2024.” REUTERS, AFP