Cam Smith fears the 120-year-old Australian Open might “be misplaced” if the format of the dual-gender occasion just isn’t modified instantly.
Taking his heavy criticism of final yr’s occasion into 2025, Smith declared the format was holding again what needs to be an inflow of the world’s greatest males’s gamers.
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His Ripper GC teammate Matt Jones, a two-time Australian Open champ, additionally confirmed the dual-gender format was one of many causes he didn’t play in 2024. He stated the lads’s match needs to be a “stand-alone occasion” because the all-Australian staff got here collectively to organize for his or her 2025 LIV Golf marketing campaign.
Smith set tongues wagging at Kingston Heath final December, railing in opposition to the gentle set-up of the sandbelt layouts and calling out excuses a couple of week of moist climate as “bullsh*t”. Different main male gamers declared the programs had been made simpler to cater for the feminine gamers, as each the lads’s and ladies’s titles had been contested on the identical programs on the similar time for the third yr operating.
Golf Australia chief govt James Sutherland was at pains to clarify that the directive given to course employees was to make the programs “laborious and quick”. He additionally stated the dire monetary state of the tournaments, with the ladies’s Open dropping thousands and thousands of {dollars} when performed by itself, had pressured the change.
Smith stated he would proceed to be vocal on “factors I care about”. The 2022 British Open champ and LIV star, who’s quick turning into the strongest voice in Australian golf, stated his emotions had been the “speak of the city” amongst his friends and the match might undergo significantly sooner or later if speedy modifications weren’t made.
“I haven’t instantly spoken to James. I feel he positively is aware of my emotions, but it surely’s a dialog that I have to have for certain as a result of I don’t like the best way it’s going,” he stated from Florida on Thursday.
“I really feel like we’ve to placed on a very good match and the gamers will come. I feel that’s why we’ve seen an absence of high-ranking gamers the previous few years. I do know I’m not the one one who feels this fashion and it has positively been the speak of the city with the Australian professionals.
“Hopefully, we will work as a staff and actually type this occasion out as a result of it could be a disgrace to see the Australian Open be misplaced.”
Adam Scott additionally skipped the occasion, citing a have to “clean up” with little-known American Ryggs Johnston taking the lads’s title.
Smith stated whereas transferring the Australian Open to February to align with the LIV Golf occasion in Adelaide “might work”, timing was not the problem, somewhat making an attempt to finish two occasions on the similar time.
“I feel the largest situation is the format and the way it’s structured,” he stated.
“Two years in the past, Scotty was 4 pictures off the lead (within the closing spherical) and he teed off the tenth gap like two hours earlier than the leaders. Stuff like that simply can’t occur and it occurred once more (in 2024).
“I do know we had some dangerous climate and that’s what they had been leaning on, but it surely’s not how the Aussie Open needs to be, notably in Melbourne. It (the course) must be agency and quick and one of the best participant must win. I’m undecided if that has been the case.”
Jones, who gained the Australian Open in 2015 and 2019, additionally made his ideas clear.
“I’m the identical strains as Cam, I did have a scheduling situation, however on the similar time I’m undecided I’d have come down and performed it both means due to the format,” he stated.
“A males’s Australian Open needs to be a stand-alone occasion.”
There isn’t a affirmation on a date, location or format for the 2025 Australian Open.
Sutherland stated on the finish of final yr’s occasion GA was not “locked in” to persevering with the dual-gender format.