Saudi International: Open champion Cameron Smith says golf’s world rankings in danger of becoming ‘obsolete’
- Australian is still world No 4 despite switching to LIV Golf tournaments which do not get ranking points
- Smith is playing alongside likes of Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed at PIF Saudi International
Cameron Smith believes golf’s world rankings are on the verge of becoming meaningless, and said while having them “would be nice” they were not essential.
The Australian is still ranked No 4 despite his switch to LIV Golf, and could add a healthy number of points to his total at this week’s PIF Saudi International.
Smith is one of 12 major winners in the strongest field ever assembled for an Asian Tour event, with the likes of Dustin Johnson, Sergio Garcia, Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed all expected to take part at Royal Greens Golf and Country Club.
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And while there is the opportunity to climb the rankings this week, the fact Johnson is now 46th in the world and Koepka and Reed have dropped out of the top 50 entirely has raised questions over how relevant the Official World Golf Ranking will be if LIV tournaments are not recognised in the future.
“When you rock up to a tournament you know who you have to beat, whether there’s a world ranking or not,” Smith said. “There’s generally seven or eight guys that are in that field that you know are going to put up a pretty good fight.”
The Open champion said while he had tried not to take the row over rankings “not that badly”, he did admit to it hurting, especially as he believed he was close to being world No 1.
“That was definitely something that I wanted to tick off, but the longer this stuff goes on, the more obsolete those rankings become,” he said. “And that’s just the long and short of it I think. Do we need them? That would be nice, but like I said, you know who you’ve got to beat on the golf course.”
Despite saying that becoming No 1 was something he wanted to achieve, Smith said he had not set any particular goals for the following season, and preferred to work day to day.
“I’m more of a kind of tick-the-box guy, I think,” he said. “Just do what I can do to make myself a better golfer that day, and hopefully when I’m teeing it up in a tournament, it all comes together, and I can there Saturday and Sunday and hole a few nice putts and lift the trophy.”
Smith finished fourth in Saudi Arabia last year, and with the wind blowing in off the Red Sea again expected to influence matters, he said with his struggles off the tee it was “a really tough course”.
“When it gets a little bit breezy, those fairways become pretty tight, and there’s a couple of shots out there that are really uncomfortable for me,” Smith said.
“I think you have to play – you obviously have to play well to win, but you just kind of have to navigate your way around and hole some putts. It gets really tricky once it gets windy holing those five-, six-footers with some gusty winds.”
Separately, Sebastian Munoz of Colombia is the latest player to be joining LIV, according to The Daily Telegraph, which previously said Mito Pereira of Chile was also making the switch.
Both are in the field this week, even though neither PGA Tour member requested a conflicting event release to play, as was the case for the likes of Cameron Young and Cameron Champ.
Pereira is also listed in the field next week for the Asian Tour’s International Series stop in Oman, electing to pass on the US$20 million purse at the WM Phoenix Open.
LIV Golf has not officially announced new additions to its league, which starts next month at Mayakoba in Mexico.
