Asian Tour CEO Cho Minn Thant says circuit no longer playing second fiddle to European rival, thinks golfers should play where they want
- Tour boss Cho Minn Thant believes roles have been reversed and his organisation is no longer the minor tour
- With the DP World Tour threatening to sanction members who played on the International Series, Cho said there was room for both to thrive
The Asian Tour is now a higher priority for golfers around the world and the days when it played second fiddle to the European Tour are over, according to its CEO.
Cho Minn Thant said in many ways the roles had been reversed, with players using the DP World Tour to fill gaps in their schedule rather than planning their year around those events.
Calling the support from the likes of Kiradech Aphibarnrat and Jazz Janewattananond, who has played in multiple Asian Tour events this year and finished in a tie for ninth at the DPWT’s event in Japan on Sunday, an “enormous endorsement”, Cho said the approach from players had “quite clearly changed”.
“In the past the Asian Tour was the minor tour, and there were always players looking to play the European Tour and Japan Tour,” he said.
“We’ve always had players who have tried to keep membership on other tours, and we’ve always been a second or third priority for them, so it’s very clearly changed, where a player like Jazz is prioritising the Asian Tour. Scott Hend, Wade Ormsby, in the past they would commit to Europe first and then we would fill the gaps, it’s almost the other way around now.”
The decision by some to play on the Asian Tour, and particularly in its first International Series event in England last year, has riled DPWT boss Keith Pelley to such an extent he has threatened to sanction those that did so.
Cho though believes players should be allowed to choose when and where they play, and highlighted the decision made by Kiradech to leave the PGA Tour and return to Asia and Europe.
“For a guy to do that and make that career-changing decision, is huge for us,” Cho said. “I’d hate to see the restrictions from the European Tour try and impact the way he [Kiradech] wants to structure his season.”
Which is not to say there aren’t limits, but while the European and US tours have rules governing when their members can compete elsewhere, the Asian Tour’s only requirement is players must enter a minimum of nine of its 24 events in a season.
A failure to do so leads to a player losing their cards, unless they have an exemption as a winner or fall into another category.
“We have our policy and the DP World Tour has theirs,” Cho said. “The thing that we stand on is the minimum-event policy rather than trying to control where the players can or can’t play.
“You look at a player like Kiradech or Jazz, they’ve played quite a number of Asian Tour events earlier this year, then we have somewhat of a summer break [May, June, July] then we start going again, week after week after week from August until the end of November.
“They really do have the opportunity to play in both tours, and I do think it will be fantastic for them to play on both tours and its better for the tours if they are allowed to do so.”
The Asian Tour’s growth has been fuelled by significant financial support from LIV Golf, which has pumped US$300 million into it, enabling the creation of the International Series.
There are 10 such tournaments on the Tour this year, with the expectation that will increase to 14 in the future, and according to sources the series will play a pivotal role in how the LIV Invitational circuit develops in the future.
Last week at the tournament in Adelaide, Greg Norman, the LIV Golf CEO, hinted at a relegation process, and talk on the Asian Tour has focused on the expansion of the pathway between the two, which already sees the player that tops the series order of merit step up to compete alongside the likes of Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson and Cameron Smith.
“It’s all about giving our members choices, they can either go to DP World Tour qualifying school, they can go to PGA qualifying school, there is this pathway to LIV, or they can stay on the Asian Tour, there are various pathways they can take,” Cho said.
Pelley’s approach, which he has said would be guided by members of his Tour, risks forcing players to choose sides, although that is a decision many have already had to make.
Last year’s series event at Slaley Hall in Newcastle took place in the same week as the Porsche European Open in Germany, this year it will coincide with the ISPS Handa World Invitational in Northern Ireland in August.
But the venue has moved to Close House, Lee Westwood’s home course, and the Englishman will host a tournament Cho hopes will attract the likes of Ian Poulter, Paul Casey and other big names from the LIV circuit.
The following week the Asian Tour goes to Scotland for the first time for the St Andrews Bay Championship, while the DPWT will be in Prague for the D+D Real Czech Masters.
“We’re always intelligent about scheduling on the Asian Tour,” Cho said. “We would never schedule a tournament in Thailand the same week as the DP World Tour’s tournament in Thailand, and hopefully vice versa.
“We looked quite carefully when selecting those dates for the two UK events, so that we wouldn’t clash with bigger events like the Scottish Open. We made sure we were going up against the smaller events, and pretty much like tennis, if you look at the ATP, the 500 level events, they often have multiple events on at the same time and the players just choose where they go.”
