{"id":531323,"date":"2026-04-15T01:34:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T01:34:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/531323\/"},"modified":"2026-04-15T01:34:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T01:34:10","slug":"major-champion-set-for-first-start-since-liv-golf-exit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/531323\/","title":{"rendered":"Major champion set for first start since LIV Golf exit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former Open champion Henrik Stenson will make his first competitive appearance this week since his exit from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.golfmagic.com\/tour\/liv-golf\" data-entity-type=\"taxonomy_term\" data-entity-uuid=\"a98bdd27-b225-4fc9-b7d2-bbff98678a53\" data-entity-substitution=\"canonical\" title=\"LIV Golf\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">LIV Golf<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Swede was relegated from the PIF-backed breakaway last season and decided not to attempt to try and earn his spot back.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Instead, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.golfmagic.com\/players\/henrik-stenson\" data-entity-type=\"taxonomy_term\" data-entity-uuid=\"7f46c428-59ea-4dd1-ac90-082320d206a3\" data-entity-substitution=\"canonical\" title=\"Henrik Stenson\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Stenson<\/a>, revealed plans to return to the DP World Tour and play in events for over-50s.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stenson, who turned 50 on 5 April, will tee up at this week&#8217;s Senior PGA Championship in Florida.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The $3m tournament will be played over 16-19 April at The Concession Golf Club.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>Disgraced former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.golfmagic.com\/tour\/us-masters\" data-entity-type=\"taxonomy_term\" data-entity-uuid=\"fd1c19ee-39b5-46a7-b7ea-1a016bac0b77\" data-entity-substitution=\"canonical\" title=\"The Masters\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Masters<\/a> champion, Angel Cabrera, returns to defend his title.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Twelve months ago, Cabrera reeled in Padraig Harrington over the closing holes and won by a shot.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It was his second senior major championship victory in seven days.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Major champions Michael Campbell, Stewart Cink, Darren Clarke, John Daly, Ernie Els, Harrington, Retief Goosen, Zach Johnson, Bernhard Langer, Vijay Singh, Mike Weir and the aforementioned Harrington are among the field this week.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Cink is the pre-tournament favourite, followed by Johnson, Steven Alker, Els and Stenson.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>The Senior PGA Championship is the first of five major championships on the schedule.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The Regions Tradition will be played in May, whilst the U.S. Senior Open, Kaulig Companies Championship and Senior Open will be played in July.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stenson will also play on the Legends Tour later this month, according to Today&#8217;s Golfer.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He is scheduled to take part at the upcoming Barbados Legends event at Apes Hill, hosted by former Masters champion Ian Woosnam.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stenson plots DP World Tour return<\/p>\n<p>In November, bunkered were the first to report that Stenson planned to return to the DP World Tour in 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>He was forced to pay over \u00a31 million in fines to the European-based circuit after competing in conflicting LIV events.<\/p>\n<p>Stenson was among the first players to be recruited by LIV Golf in 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He resigned from the DP World Tour in 2023, the same month he was stripped of the European Ryder Cup captaincy.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He was named a co-captain of Majesticks GC alongside his former Ryder Cup teammates Lee Westwood and Ian Poulter.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Despite winning on his first LIV Golf start in Bedminster, New Jersey, the Swede struggled for consistency.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>Last season, Stenson finished 49th in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.golfmagic.com\/tour\/liv-golf\/liv-golf-individual-standings-2026\" data-entity-type=\"node\" data-entity-uuid=\"7ed77caa-a151-4384-81e6-70655c94a019\" data-entity-substitution=\"canonical\" title=\"LIV Golf individual standings 2026: Who is leading the way?\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">individual standings<\/a> and was relegated. He was overtaken by Poulter at the final event.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It was the first time the league enforced relegation.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It was understood the move was part of the league&#8217;s attempts to be recognised by the sports global rankings body.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>LIV Golf were granted Official World Golf Ranking points before their latest season began.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to our Newsletter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former Open champion Henrik Stenson will make his first competitive appearance this week since his exit from LIV&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[5904,97966,11769,8693,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-531323","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-henrik-stenson","10":"tag-liv-golf","11":"tag-pga-tour","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}