LIV Golf League member and three-time DP World Tour winner Sam Horsfield started seven over for his front nine at the Open Championship Final Qualifying at West Lancashire Golf Club. Despite still having 27 holes to get back in contention, the Englishman decided that that was enough and walked off the course after nine holes. It’s not the best look, but it’s also not uncommon in these kind of qualifying events; at last month’s U.S. Open, more than a dozen tour pros failed to finish up all 36 holes. And fellow LIV golfer Adrian Meronk also dropped out of his Final Qualifying event on Tuesday in Scotland after playing only 18 holes.

What made Horsfield’s move unusual, however, was that he apparently didn’t tell R&A officials that he was withdrawing from the event. The R&A confirmed to Golf Digest that Horsfield was ultimately “disqualified after leaving the venue without informing officials.”

The 28-year-old was one of a handful of LIV pros among the 72 golfers at West Lancashire, including Lucas Herbert, Andy Ogletree and Harold Varner III, looking to snag one of the five tickets to Royal Portrush. There were four Final Qualifying sites overall, with 20 spots into this year’s Open up for grabs. A total of 14 LIV players are among those trying to earn their way into the major with Lee Westwood, Herbert and Dean Burmester playing their way to Portrush by being medalists in three of the four events.

Horsfield has teed off in three Open Championships thus far, with a career-best T-67 performance back in 2021, but he certainly won’t have a chance to improve on that showing this time around. The University of Florida golfer placed fifth at LIV’s inaugural event, winning $975,000, and his last DP World Tour win was back in May 2022 at the Soudal Open.

A torn labrum in his right hip and subsequent surgery sidelined him for a good portion of 2023, but Horsfield returned to the Majesticks at the tail-end of the year.

This non-finish finish is the latest in a precarious start to Horsfield’s 2025, in which he has just one top 10 over nine LIV events, with a T-7 at LIV Golf Adelaide. In his last seven starts, Horsfield has finished T-50, T-49, T-27, T-41, T-29, T-33 and T-25.

RELATED: Here’s every player in the field (so far) at Royal Portrush

UPDATE, July 1: After news surfaced of his DQ, Horsfield, who played in the LIV Golf Dallas event that ended on Sunday, took to Instagram to offer an explanation for why he stopped playing after nine holes.

“So I flew back home Sunday night and landed into Heathrow at 4pm by the time I got up to west lancs it was about late. Had a bit of dinner and fell asleep at 1030/11. At 1AM the fire alarm went off and we had to go satnd outside for an hour or so. I eventually got back sleep around 530 for a 6am alarm which I slept thru but fortunately my caddy woke me up.. I felt completely dizzy and out of it all day. Don’t listen to the propaganda out there against liv players by some of these pages. Hope this clears things up.”

Main image: Richard Martin-Roberts/R&A

Follow Golf Digest Middle East on social media

Instagram

X

Facebook

YouTube