Xander Schauffele and Scottie Scheffler disagreed on LIV Golf stars playing at Ryder Cup

The move to allow LIV Golf players to qualify for the U.S. Ryder Cup team is likely to elicit a divided response from those loyal to the PGA Tour.
In a significant development, LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed tour that sparked a bitter divide in the sport after its launch in 2022, has been added to the PGA of America’s list of “approved tours”.
This decision grants LIV players membership of the organisation, a prerequisite for eligibility to compete in the biennial showdown against Europe. Notably, Brooks Koepka was the sole LIV representative on the U.S. team at the 2023 event in Italy, having received a wildcard pick from captain Zach Johnson.

The revised eligibility criteria will pave the way for prominent players like U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau and Dustin Johnson to join the fray. Interestingly, Xander Schauffele had previously expressed his desire to partner with Johnson at the Ryder Cup, overlooking his teammates, including close friend Patrick Cantlay.
However, not everyone may be as receptive to the inclusion of LIV players. World number one and Masters champion Scottie Scheffler had earlier suggested that those who defected to LIV should face some form of penalty for abandoning the PGA Tour.
“That’s definitely a complicated issue that I’m not sitting too far on one side of the fence with that,” Scheffler shared with Golf Channel. “I think there’s a different level of player that left you had some guys that left our tour and then sued our tour, that wasn’t really in great taste.
“And then you had some other guys that just left and they wanted to do something different, and everybody made their decision, and I have no bad blood toward the guys that left.
“But a path toward coming back, it wouldn’t be a very popular decision, I think, if they just came back like nothing ever happened. They did kind of leave and they left our tour, that’s just part of it.
“There should be a pathway back for them, but they definitely shouldn’t be able to come back without any sort of contribution to the tour.”
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The PGA Tour announced a change in stance, stating: “Going forward, all LIV Golf players are eligible for the PGA Championship and any American player who qualifies for the Ryder Cup on points or is added to the US team as a captain’s pick is eligible to compete.
“This is consistent with LIV Golf players competing in the PGA Championship the past two years. Brooks Koepka was a member of the US Ryder Cup team last year.”
Discussions about reuniting men’s golf continue more than a year after the PGA and Europe’s DP World Tour announced a “framework agreement” for a merger with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, the financial backing behind LIV.