LIV Golf event had more world ranking points than DP World Tour

Eleven players made upward moves in the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR) after LIV Riyadh saw points awarded to the Saudi backed tour for the first time.

Elvis Smylie won the first event of the season, earning almost 23 ranking points in the process and the Aussie moved to world number 77 from a lowly 134.

Smylie has been labelled as a future world number one by his Ripper GC teammate Cameron Smith after the former DP World Tour winner won on his LIV debut.

“It’s a dream come true,” he said. “I really didn’t know what to expect this week. Playing at night is obviously a whole different ballgame out here.

“I wanted to come out here and make a statement. I wanted to prove that I’m one of the best out here, and I feel like I’ve done that, and it’s only up from here.”

Runner-up Jon Rahm also made a significant leap. Ordinarily he might have fallen out of the top-100 in the world for the first time since turning pro in 2017 but the Spaniard made a leap of 30 places from 97th to 67th.

An interesting fact to note is that the DP World Tour’s Qatar Masters was ranked with a higher strength of field at 121 to LIV Golf’s 108 by the OWGR yet it’s winner Patrick Reed received two fewer ranking points than Smylie.

Reed broke back into the top-20 in the world for the first time since 2021 while Chris Gotterup’s fourth PGA Tour win and second in three weeks propelled him to world number five.

Tom McKibbin and Graeme McDowell threatened top-10 finishes at LIV Riyadh but will have to wait until this week’s event in Adelaide to earn points on the tour for the first time.

McKibbin fell outside the top-80 in the world today despite reaching a career high 74th last year as he won on the Asian Tour in Hong Kong and played very consistently on the DP World Tour.

LIV OWGR Winners

Elvis Smylie: 134 to 77

Jon Rahm: 97 to 67

Peter Uihlein: 199 to 154

Abraham Ancer: 616 to 449

Thomas Pieters: 564 to 419

David Puig: 95 to 87

Thomas Detry: 62 to 63

Sebastian Munoz: 767 to 566

Lucas Herbert: 257 to 223

Branden Grace: 463 to 401

Byeong Hun An: 111 to 107