Open champion Cameron Smith has called claims that LIV Golf players don't play 'real golf anymore' as "BS."
The Aussie, winner of five events last year including his maiden Major at the 150th Open as well as the Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass, heads to Augusta National next week for The Masters and is hoping to both play well and prove a point to LIV critics.
Some have criticised the format in LIV Golf where reduced fields of 48 players tee it up over just 54-holes without a cut compared to much larger fields on the PGA Tour where play is over 72-holes with a 36-hole cut.
Smith is hoping for a LIV player to win one the four men's Majors this year and says it's important for them to show a "high standard" of golf up against the best of the PGA Tour.
He'll be fancying his chances of slipping on the Green Jacket after three top-fives and one top-10 at Augusta in his last five starts. He was T2nd in 2020 and T3rd last year.
“First and foremost for me, I'm trying to go there and play the best golf I can,” Smith told Golf Digest.
"I think it is important for us [LIV players] to go there and really show a high standard of golf, which we know we're all capable of. Most of us will get four cracks at it this year [in the Majors], and hopefully we can get a win out of it.
“Maybe we just show a really hearty effort. I think for us, internally, it's the right thing. There's a lot of chatter going around about ‘these guys don't play real golf anymore’ and I think it's BS to be honest and we just want show people that.”
Smith is by far the highest-ranked LIV Golf player in the world rankings at No.5, although he is set to be replaced by Max Homa next week and drop to sixth. He was World No.2 after his Open Championship win, which meant he commanded a rumored $100m+ fee to join the Saudi-backed circuit.
Last month he said his world ranking slide "hurts" and also claimed that the Official World Golf Ranking system is becoming more "obsolete."
The 29-year-old, captain of the the all-Aussie Ripper GC franchise, won his first LIV event last September at Rich Harvest Farms in Chicago.
