These included McIlroy as well as Tiger Woods and the reaction was inevitably febrile when Monahan confronted the players he supposedly works for in a members-owned organisation which pays him about £10 million per annum.
Johnson Wagner estimated that the negative/positive split of the room was “90/10”, with Monahan coming under siege.
“There’s a lot of disappointment today,” Ryan Armour, a member of the Player Advisory Council, said. “What I have been told by my peers is that they feel betrayed right now. There must have been 20-25 guys who used that word. They feel backstabbed. And they feel slighted… For a year and a half now, we have been told how evil certain golf leagues are, how evil their funding is and where it’s coming from. No financials have changed hands yet, but the mood in the room is that guys feel used.”
Geoff Ogilvy concurred. “I’m glad I wasn’t Jay today,” said the 2006 US Open champion. “There’s some grumpy players in there. I feel a little bit sort of, not lied to, but just that the tour has sort of changed its position quickly and dropped it on us really fast. So maybe there’s a feeling of a lack of trust a little bit in the leadership.
“It just feels like nobody really knows what’s happening and the players are out of the loop. But no one really ever likes being out of a loop. You know, everyone likes a bit of information, and especially when it’s your livelihood and your job and the sport that you love.”
Monahan explained the merger was necessary to put an end to the lawsuits. He described the agreement as a “framework” and acknowledged that it still needed to be approved by the Tour’s policy board. Yet the room knew it will be waved through. It was not only Murray calling for his head and the ‘hypocrite” accusation was being liberally hurled around, a fact Monahan later acknowledged.
“I recognise that people are going to call me a hypocrite,” he said. “But anytime I said anything, I said it based on the information I had at the moment, and based on someone trying to compete for the PGA Tour and our players. I accept those criticisms.”
