Golf: TGL Launch
By Prof Dr Ian Blackshaw
TGL -‘Tomorrow’s Golf League’ – will tee off on 8 January 2025 at 02 00 (GMT) at the SoFi Center in Florida, USA.
According to Rory Mcllroy, who is promoting this virtual version of golf with Tiger Woods, TGL will help to take the sport “into the 21st century.”
Describing it as “golf re-imagined”, Mcllroy added:
“We have teams, obviously there’s a lot of technology involved, trying to bring it into the digital era. A lot of things we have taken from other sports like a shot clock, a timeout, things that you don’t see in regular golf.”
TGL will feature six teams of four players each, who will play five matches in a round-robin league format between 7 January and 4 March 2025, and the top four teams will earn a place in the play-offs, which will begin on 17 March 2025.
Before each match, each team will choose three players to complete in 15-hole competitions, split into two sessions: nine holes of three-man alternate shots; followed by six holes of single players in head-to-head play.
Points are awarded for winning a hole and the team with the most points will be the winner. In the event of a draw, the winner will be decided by a nearest-the-pin competition.
The playing arena, 100 yards long by 50 yards wide, will accommodate 1,500 spectators.
Thirty holes are available for the competition with fifteen in use for each match.
A 40-second shot clock will operate and any player, who takes longer, will incur a one-stroke penalty. The teams will also have four timeouts.
Several of golf’s top players will take part and TGL will be televised on Sky Sports.
The promoters of TGL are hoping to appeal to a wider audience, especially young people.
Whether they will succeed or not, as the English colloquial saying puts it, ‘the proof of the pudding will be in the eating’!
Prof Dr Ian Blackshaw may be contacted by e-mail at ‘
