The Australian Open males’s and girls’s golf championships will revert to being held individually.
Golf Australia has made the choice to finish the Open’s males’s and girls’s occasions being performed concurrently on the identical programs, as has been the case since 2022.
The decision comes off the again of a participant revolt towards the format with main Australian golfers like Cameron Smith, Hannah Inexperienced, Marc Leishman, Minjee Lee and Lucas Herbert all criticising the arrange throughout final yr’s event in Melbourne.
The unique resolution to carry the 2 occasions collectively was made based mostly on fears concerning the monetary viability of the ladies’s occasion being a stand-alone proposition.
The Covid-19 pandemic prevented the boys’s Open being held in 2020 and 2021, and the ladies’s in 2021, and the brand new format with women and men enjoying on the identical course in separate teams, and from separate tees, was hailed as a “world-first” by event organisers.
However Smith was a sceptic from the outset, and fellow main champion Adam Scott was one other high-profile Australian, who was vital behind the scenes.
“I feel the largest situation is the format and the way it’s structured,” Smith stated final month.
The LIV Golf star even went so far as calling the heavy rain that lashed Melbourne within the lead-up to final yr’s event at Kingston Heath and Victoria a “bulls*** excuse” for the greens and fairways being delicate as an alternative of onerous and quick because the Melbourne Sandbelt is world famend for.
Smith was indicating that the course had been neutered to higher swimsuit the dual-gender format, saying “it’s been ready like this for a cause” and his want for the respective occasions to not run collectively has been granted.
Golf Australia chief government officer James Sutherland acknowledged that he’s now “assured that each nationwide open championships will stand on their very own two ft and prosper in their very own proper”.
“Following our annual occasion evaluation, which included discussions with key stakeholders, Golf Australia has made the choice to separate the Australian Open males’s and girls’s tournaments,” Sutherland stated.
“We’re happy with what has been achieved over the previous three years with mixed-gender Australian Opens, along with the All-Talents championship. With report crowds and broadcast audiences there’s a lot to be grateful for.
“Our long-term occasion technique is to construct the profile of our tournaments and to showcase the sport on the highest degree.
“This transfer aligns to our technique and can permit flexibility to higher adapt to the ever-changing panorama in world golf.
“We look ahead to persevering with productive conversations with key companions and stakeholders across the location and different key features of upcoming nationwide opens.”
The boys’s Australian Open is ready to once more be performed in late November-early December, whereas the ladies’s occasion is reportedly more likely to be shifted to March, ranging from subsequent yr.
The boys’s championship, together with the Australian PGA Championship, has been co-sanctioned with the DP World Tour for the previous three years, and serves as a part of the previously named European Tour’s Opening Swing, however the ladies’s championship has gone with out co-sanctioning after beforehand being an LPGA and a Girls European Tour occasion.
It was an LPGA co-sanctioned event from 2012 to 2020 with superstars of the game like world primary Nelly Korda and Olympic gold medallist Lydia Ko amongst these to elevate the trophy in that point.
However prior to now three years, the large names haven’t come because the nationwide open was performed the week after the LPGA’s Tour Championship and final yr, Australian main winners Inexperienced and Lee arrived in Melbourne barely 24 hours earlier than the opening spherical started and didn’t get the possibility to play a follow spherical.
Main ladies’s gamers are hopeful {that a} return to the beginning of the season, earlier than the LPGA’s Asian swing, might revert the occasion to its earlier standing.