Cameron Smith rages after missing seventh straight cut at Australian PGA

Cameron Smith didn’t sugarcoat it after another miserable week—this time on home soil—at the BMW Australian PGA, the opening event of the 2026 DP World Tour season. The Australian fan favourite was left seething following a second-round collapse at Royal Queensland GC, extending a brutal run of form that now includes seven straight missed cuts in OWGR events.

For a player who once sat at World No.2 and lifted the Claret Jug at St Andrews in 2022, the decline has been staggering with him slumping to a remarkable career low of 345th in the world. And on Friday in Brisbane, the frustration finally boiled over.

Smith, 32, began the day on the projected cut line at 2-under, and a birdie at the 2nd provided a flicker of hope. But a bogey at the 4th set the tone for what would eventually become another unravelled round.

Three bogeys in four holes from the 11th left him scrambling, and although he rolled in an eight-footer at the 17th party hole to give the crowd something to cheer, disaster swiftly followed. 

Smith missed the 18th green, then three-putted his way to a double-bogey six, closing with a 4-over 75 and finishing the week at 2-over par—four shots outside the cut line.

“It was shit,” fumed Smith in front of reporters. 

“I don’t know, I just don’t know. I was so confused.

“I was feeling good, really confident and just couldn’t get anything going. 

It was weird. It can definitely get in your head, I think it is in my head.”

It was a round—and a reaction—that perfectly summed up his 2025 season.

Smith's latest early exit compounds a grim stretch for the LIV Golf star. Smith hasn’t won anywhere in the world since his Bedminster victory in August 2023, and he remains winless in every OWGR-counting event since joining LIV.

He was the only player to miss the cut at all four majors in 2025, then failed to make the weekend in his next three starts. 

Smith will now look to bounce back at next week’s Australian Open at Royal Melbourne—a tournament he has never won down the years. 

Who knows exactly where it's gone so wrong for Smith this season, he's not even sure himself, but he has undergone a big life change becoming a father for the first time when welcoming son Remy with wife Shanel in April.

Smith is now very much open about struggling mentally during his slump, admitting he’s wrestling with “inner demons” following what he called a “hometown horror show”.

“I don’t think about golf often, but in the last couple of months I’ve thought about it a lot and I want to get back to where I was,” Smith told reporters of his winless run. 

“I do know what the answer is; it’s just to keep working hard and try to be patient.”

While Smith’s campaign fizzled out again, the top of the leaderboard is loaded heading into the weekend.

Kazuma Kobori surged into the lead at 10-under after a sensational 8-under 63, finishing with four consecutive birdies. 

Brett Rankin, Wenyi Ding and Anthony Quayle—who has Tiger Woods’ legendary former caddie Steve Williams on his bag for two weeks—sit one back.

Min Woo Lee, champion here in 2023, lurks at 8-under alongside a resurgent Chris Wood, while Cameron Davis, Daniel Hillier, Marc Leishman, Jose Ballester and England’s Marco Penge are all within striking distance at 7-under. Adam Scott also kept himself firmly in the mix at 6-under.

LIV star Joaquin Niemann, the pre-tournament favourite, joined Smith on the sidelines after posting back-to-back 71s to miss the cut on level par.

With Smith's form in freefall and confidence visibly shaken, he now heads to Royal Melbourne for next week’s Australian Open, hoping to stop a slump that’s stretched to nearly two and a half years without a global win.

The event will also see the much-anticipated return of Rory McIlroy, making his first appearance in Australia since 2014 and aiming to recapture the title he won in 2013.

For Smith, though, the mission is simple: find something—anything—to rebuild from.

Because after another bruising week, summed up with an expletive, the pressure is mounting fast.