Viktor Hovland fires 'precedent' warning PGA Tour over returning LIV golfers

Viktor Hovland has warned the PGA Tour to consider the precedent they are setting by allowing LIV golfers back on the American circuit.

Brooks Koepka was the first major champion to quit the Saudi-Arabia backed league in December and has returned via a hastily-enacted returning member programme. 

Former Masters winner Patrick Reed has followed in Koepka's footsteps but will have to wait until August to tee up on the PGA Tour again as he wasn't eligible for the new scheme. 

Hovland told reporters before the WM Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale that he has no issue with both players crossing back over. 

And he even reacted to news of their sensational returns indifferently. 

But he believes the Tour may have put themselves in a difficult position. 

"Just for my personal standpoint, I would say I enjoy playing against those guys," said Hovland. 

"I think, obviously, Patrick Reed being a major champion and great player and Brooks a five-time major champion, that's a great addition to the PGA Tour. 

"They're great players and I want to compete against the greatest players out there. I think it just makes the products, the fields better."

He added: "It does kind of put the Tour in a tricky position now.

"You've said one thing for a long time and now we’re changing things.

"What precedent are you setting then to the future players now if I can go to a rival tour, get paid, and now seemingly come back again without the biggest consequences?"

Koepka has been stung as a result of his decision to return to the PGA Tour. 

The returning member programme stipulates that he must make a $5m charitable donation to an agreed-upon charity. 

He has no access to the player equity programme until 2030, won't collect FedEx Cup bonus payments this year and has to earn his way into the signature events on merit. 

Whether or not that is severe is up for debate. 

Jon Rahm, Cameron Smith and Bryson DeChambeau were also eligible to return to the PGA Tour but all three players committed to LIV's 2026 campaign. 

DeChambeau revealed on the eve of LIV's curtain-raiser that he was close to agreeing a contract extension. 

For his part, Koepka said the punishment was "harsh. 

"I understand why the Tour did that," he said. "It's meant to hurt."

Asked whether recent developments would make him reconsider his career path, Hovland said: "I don't really have an opinion on that to be honest. 

"That's something the Tour has to figure out. 

"I'm sure there is a lot of people not going to be super happy about that, but at the end of the day I just want to compete against the best players in the world.

"I'm in a place where I have to figure stuff out in my own game, and that's basically where I’m focusing on. 

"I don't really want to focus on what the Tour should be doing right now."

This is not the first time Hovland has put the Tour's leadership under the microscope. 

During an appearance on a Norwegian podcast in December 2023, Hovland criticised their "arrogance" after PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan struck a peace agreement with LIV's financiers behind players' backs. 

"The management has not done a good job," he previously said.

"They almost see the players as labour, and not as part of the membership. After all, we are the PGA Tour. Without the players, there is nothing. 

"When you then get to see what happens behind closed doors, how the management actually makes decisions, which are not in the players' best interest, but best for themselves and what they think is best.

"They are not professional golfers after all. They are businessmen who say that, 'No, it should look like this and that.' 

"There is a great deal of arrogance behind it all."