As LIV Golf uncertainty grows, one of the league’s star performers has revealed talks have been held over a possible PGA Tour future…

Multiple LIV Golf players have reached out to the various established tours in recent weeks as part of their contingency planning due to the league’s uncertain future.

TG has learned that interest from LIV players in using the DP World Tour as a landing ground next season has significantly increased, while the league battles for its survival. LIV has been targeting $300million in investment to realize ambitions of ‘LIV 2.0’ – a reimagined and streamlined circuit for the 2027 campaign.

But ahead of a players’ meeting ahead of LIV’s return to Trump Bedminster on Tuesday, there had been no clarity on alternate funding that would help prop up the tour after the retreat of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. Uncertainty, meanwhile, grows over the status of LIV’s Team Championship in Michigan at the end of this month, which appears in a state of flux.

Until now, LIV players have been keeping their cards close to their chest when it comes to their playing options for next season. Lucas Herbert has been one of LIV’s biggest advocates and told TG this summer that his experiences on the league have taken his game to another level.

The Australian has won two of the last four LIV events – including breaking the scoring record at LIV UK as he romped to victory at the JCB Golf & Country Club last month. Yet in a press conference at Trump Bedminster, Herbert was asked whether he had been in discussions with the PGA Tour over the prospect of a return if LIV fails to preserve its future.

“I haven’t personally had any discussions but my manager has,” Herbert said. “If LIV were to go away and you’ve got nowhere to play, I think ultimately you need somewhere to play as a professional golfer. So we’re just doing due diligence, having that conversation. As I said, I haven’t had it personally, and my preference would be to still be playing out here if that was still an option.

“Conversations have been had without me being privy to them. I don’t know the results of any of those either. That’s my update.”

The same question was posed to fellow Australians Cam Smith and Marc Leishman during a Ripper GC press conference on Tuesday. Both offered optimistic responses on LIV’s precarious future.

“I’m contracted to the end of next year, so I was expecting to play until the end of next year and renegotiate and hopefully go on,” Smith said. “What we’ve been able to do for golf in Australia is really quite important to me, junior golf, the Little Rippers, the event that we have down there, the people it brings out to showcase our great league. It would be a shame for all that to go away, and I feel like we’ve worked really hard over the last three or four years to kind of make that all happen.”

Leishman added: “I’m confident there will be something next year. The team is working really hard, and I would certainly like to be here next year for sure, whether it looks how it does now or something different. I would assume if it is around it’ll be something a little different, but I’m invested in this.”