Rory McIlroy got off to a fast start Thursday at his 2026 season debut in Dubai. He didn\u2019t waste any time, either, in assessing the fallout of Brooks Koepka\u2019s departure from LIV Golf and return to the PGA Tour.<\/p>\n
McIlroy, the reigning Race to Dubai champion, shot 31 over his opening nine holes and finished with a 66 to lead by one over Connor Syme and David Puig\u2014and then had a blunt appraisal of LIV Golf\u2019s current plight.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not as if they made any huge signings this year, is it?\u201d McIlroy said in an interview with\u00a0The Telegraph<\/a>. \u201cThey haven\u2019t signed anyone who moves the needle and I don\u2019t think they will. I mean, they could re-sign Bryson [DeChambeau] for hundreds of millions of dollars, but even if they do, it doesn\u2019t change their product, does it? They\u2019ll just be paying for the exact same thing. And they\u2019ve lost Brooks, so they\u2019ll be paying out all this money and …\u201d<\/p>\n LIV Golf did add several players, the highest-ranked being Thomas Detry<\/a>, who won the WM Phoenix Open last year and is giving up a spot in signature events to play for Dustin Johnson\u2019s 4Aces team.<\/p>\n This week, the league announced the addition of Australian golfer Elvis Smylie to the all-Aussie Ripper team captained by Cam Smith and PGA Tour veteran Ben An, who will captain a team of all Korean players.<\/p>\n Earlier, Viktor Perez and Laurie Canter also joined the league, which begins its fifth season next month in Saudi Arabia.<\/p>\n Last month, Koepka announced he was leaving LIV Golf with the league\u2019s blessing after four years. It was only last week that he reapplied for PGA Tour membership, his status regained quickly<\/a> with an announcement Monday that will see him debut in two weeks at the Farmers Insurance Open.<\/p>\n