Since LIV Golf hosted its first event in 2022 it has been one of the most divisive topics on the golfing landscape, with many players and fans having differing opinions on golf’s newest tour.
LIV Golf and their impact on the PGA Tour and the DP World Tour is one of the hottest topics in the game of golf right now.
The lucrative finances on offer over at LIV have proven to be very difficult to turn down for some players, and sometimes, they have been criticised as a result of their choices.
Matthew Southgate has already played 298 events on the DP World Tour, despite being just 36, and the Englishman is not there just to make up the numbers either.
He has 18 top-10s to his name during those events, and four runner-up finishes. He also has three top-25 finishes in The Open Championship to his name, including a tie for sixth place at Royal Birkdale in 2017 when Jordan Spieth won.
In the 2025 season, Southgate has made seven cuts from the 12 events he has played, with one top-10 coming at the Turkish Airlines Open in May.
The closest he came to winning on tour was when he lost out to Victor Perez by a single shot at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship in 2019.
However, a victory is surely not too far away for Southgate. He certainly has the talent and the work ethic required, but sometimes golfers just need a little bit of luck to help them get over the line.
Southgate knows all about setbacks in life – he was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 2015. However, his positive attitude meant that he bounced back with a real vigour and verve for life in general after undergoing surgery.
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Just one year later, Southgate finished in a tie for 12th at The Open at Royal Troon. To say that the 36-year-old Englishman is resilient is an understatement.
But could the DP World Tour player’s future lie with LIV Golf, if offered the chance?
Matthew Southgate delivers his honest take on LIV Golf
LIV Golf changed the landscape of the sport when they burst onto the scene back in 2022.
The Saudi-backed golf league has received harsh criticism from some sections of the media, with Brandel Chamblee one of the lead protagonists of the pile-in on LIV.
However, Southgate offered an alternative take on the debate, when speaking exclusively with The Golfing Gazette.
“LIV Golf is obviously a massive discussion to have,“ Southgate began.
“There are so many dynamics to it. It’s a strange one as a player, I’ve got a lot of friends that play on LIV, and I hold absolutely nothing against them. We’re all self employed and although it would seem a lot of the time that the tours around the world do a lot for the players, we’re actually very much self employed. Everybody’s got their own agenda and people are free to play wherever they want to play.
“I find it amazing how many people get upset about those people making the choice to go and play on any tour they want to play on, they’re free to do that. The same as everyone else is free to go and work in whatever industry they want to work in. I think too many people are too judgemental really, we should live and let live. If they’re happy playing there, then they should play there, same as if you wanted to go and work somewhere else, you’re free to do so.“
And regarding the potential chance to join LIV Golf league, he refused to rule anything out.
“If I was asked to go and play on LIV, I would have to consider the offer that was made,“ Southgate admitted. “But my general feel on my own structure to what I’m doing, I still have the goal of being the best player that I can possibly be and I’ve always been a player who likes to play quite a lot of golf to get the best out of myself. I’m not sure that the LIV schedule would really help improve me as a player, but obviously financial reasons could change that, and obviously the dynamic on what they’re planning on doing in the future could change that.“
“I would never be silly enough to say, ‘no I wouldn’t go’, but I find it very unlikely that that would ever happen.“
Photo by Mark Runnacles/Getty ImagesSouthgate explains the mistake he made in 2024 as he sets big goal for 2026
Despite the fact that Southgate is a seasoned veteran on tour now, he still openly admitted to falling into the trap of playing too much golf in 2024.
“My game this year has been really solid. Last year was extremely busy, I probably over-golfed myself and could have done with the odd week off I think and just gone back to base to practice,“ Southgate admitted.
“The four tournaments that I played well in before Christmas, I don’t really know how I did that, I was almost just in auto-pilot mode. There was just so much traveling, I played 11 tournaments on the spin, then tour school then went down to Australia, then ended up coming all the way back to London then back down to South Africa and then off to Mauritius. I traveled the world, it felt like I traveled the whole world over in the space of about three months, so that was a bit wild.
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“My game has been good recently, I think having more time at home to practice has really, really helped. My game is trending in the right way, I’ve just got to take advantage of the starts that I do get and try and get myself a fully exempt category to be back on the tour properly for 2026 and press on.“
He certainly has the ability to go on and win a big event at some point in the future. Judging by Southgate’s stats listed above, his ball-striking is at a really high level.
His putting and bunker play have been the weakest part of his game in 2025, according to the stats, and if he can brush up on those two categories, he will undoubtedly start to contend again.
His performance at The Open in 2017 proves he has what it takes to win, and his comments on how he felt during the final day at Birkdale highlight the elite mentality that he possesses.
“The final round at Birkdale was obviously a very, very special day to me,“ Southgate said.
“I wasn’t calm obviously, but I wasn’t really, really nervous. I remember feeling excited about the round. I said to my caddie on the first tee, ‘can you think of anywhere else in the world you’d rather be right now, let’s try and go well today and try to enjoy it’. It was great, with four or five holes to go I was still in the tournament and felt like if I could birdie the last few holes I might actually have a chance by the end, so that was exciting.“
If he can compete at an Open Championship, he can compete anywhere, and his performance at Birkdale eight years ago must still give him great belief.
It will be very interesting to watch how Southgate performs between now and the end of the 2025 season, as he looks to regain his fully exempt status on the DP World Tour.