The day before a golf tournament is a liminal time for any player, but in the professional ranks it takes on an altogether greater level of importance. For many, it’s a day of nervous excitement and possibility, but mostly one they wish to be over as quickly as possible so that the real competition can begin. However, for the Asian Tour’s CEO, Cho Minn Thant, it might just be his favourite day of any tournament.

“It’s the calm before the storm,” he smiles as we survey the hubbub on the putting green and the driving range beyond from our elevated vantage point in Foxhills’ clubhouse pavilion. “Everything is taken care of to the best of our abilities: the players have arrived, the sponsors secured, any teething problems remedied. All that’s left to do is to find our winner.”

In 24 hours’ time, 156 of the game’s elite, including many of Asia’s brightest golfing prospects, will contest the England leg of the International Series, a ten-tournament programme sanctioned by the Asian Tour and backed by golf’s newest and most talked-about superpower, LIV Golf. A prize purse totalling $2m, of which $360k will be handed to the winner, is sure to sharpen the focus of competitors, but the real pot of gold at the end of the rainbow? Promotion to the LIV Golf League itself for the year-long International Series rankings leader, and the prospect of tournament purses averaging $25m. No wonder players are looking for a competitive edge.

Talk of such dizzying sums is a world away from where the Asian Tour found itself as recently as 2019 when Thant took over the top role after 12 years with the organisation. At the time, much of its schedule was dictated by co-sanctioned European Tour events and smaller local tournaments with an average prize pool somewhere between $300k and $500k, but Thant was determined to turn the tour’s fortunes and carve out a better future.

It’s just part of my DNA. A lot of the guys out on tour are friends that I used to play golf with

“The old model for the Asian Tour consisted of a collection of smaller events, let’s call them ‘national opens’, in the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, etc. And then we had the co-sanctioned events with the European Tour, which were worth $1m-1.5m, with a 50-50 split with the European Tour in terms of field allocation,” he explains.

“We always found that our best players would get to play all of those, but only ever half the field. So it was kind of splitting our Tour in two. There were the guys who were in the top 60 who got to play all the co-sanctioned and regular Asian Tour events, and then the rest coming through qualifying school and lower categories who only got to play the really small events. So there wasn’t that much of a churn in terms of Asian Tour membership because the top guys would always stay there by earning those extra ranking points.”

Thant’s frustrations remained unresolved as the pandemic began to sweep through Asia, putting a halt to any ground he had gained in his short time at the negotiating table. Indeed, far from trying to strengthen his organisation’s position, it took the full breadth of his immense contacts book to keep the tour afloat.

Considering the number of territories it travels to and the draconian measures implemented by many Asian countries during the pandemic, the Asian Tour was disproportionately affected by Covid more than any other golf tour. It wasn’t simply a disrupting factor for its schedule, it forced a wholesale 20-month hiatus from tournament play for its membership.

Without the ability to host events and fulfil sponsorship commitments, the Asian Tour was “burning through [its] reserves” (Thant told Golf Monthly in 2022) as its financial position became increasingly precarious. A slew of substantial pay cuts for its small in-house team would follow, and the players themselves were forced to find alternative sources of income to make ends meet. For a tour that over the years has proven to be a springboard for world-beating talents like KJ Choi, Cameron Smith, and more recently Tom Kim, it was a tragic situation that could have all too easily led to the tour’s demise.

But Thant is a pragmatist. Rather than crumble under the burden of protecting his sports organisation, he used the enforced break as an opportunity for a hard reset: “The pandemic was a huge momentum stopper for us. We didn’t know how we’d come out of Covid, but we dedicated our efforts into coming out the other side better. And that’s why it was a no-brainer for us to work with the Saudis.”

It’s impossible to speak about the Asian Tour’s change in fortunes without mentioning the fortune in question – namely, a financial commitment of $300m from LIV Golf Investments over the next decade, “setting up the Asian Tour as a powerful new force on the world golf stage”, as LIV’s commissioner, Greg Norman, put it at the press announcement.

As the world ground to a halt in 2020, a new tour was emerging from the shadows that would ultimately lead to the greatest disruption to the game of golf since the PGA Tour was first formed in 1968. LIV Golf, funded by the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (or PIF) and boasting the slogan “Golf, But Louder”, began wooing the sport’s top players with fat sign-on bonuses, the promise of franchise rights, a reduced playing schedule and 54-hole format, and hefty tournament purses. Astronomical figures, including a rumoured $1bn offer to Tiger Woods, started creeping along the grapevine before the first few golfers began to officially make the jump. Global stars Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, and Brooks Koepka crystallised the new league’s legitimacy and left rival tours reeling.

We didn’t know how we’d come out of Covid, but we dedicated our efforts into coming out better

Understandably, golf’s deep-pocketed antagonist was met with hostility from the golfing status quo. Since LIV’s first tournament in June 2022, the planes of professional golf have shifted exponentially, so much so that the brutal war of words in the media and in the courtroom has improbably culminated in the tabling of a ‘framework agreement’ between the PGA Tour, European Tour, and LIV Golf. Though the particulars of this deal remain largely in the boardrooms of the game’s most important decision makers, it would appear that there is an end in sight – how soon is a question for another day.

Which brings us back to Thant. During the Asian Tour’s hiatus, the CEO was recruited by LIV as an expert consultant to help bring the breakaway league to life. From his home on Black Mountain Golf Club in Thailand, the Australian native juggled the responsibilities of keeping the Asian Tour solvent while aiding Norman and PIF’s governor His Excellency Yasir bin Othman Al-Rumayyan in laying the groundwork for LIV’s impending launch.

Thant’s diplomacy with the bosses at LIV ultimately led to a conversation about the Asian Tour’s role in the wider game. The CEO’s vision for the tour, as well as the prospect of world ranking points was a prospect that intrigued the Saudis and ultimately led to the existing partnership.

Thant gambled on LIV’s success as a route to prosperity for the Asian Tour – a means for the organisation to take back control of its schedule and host stronger golf tournaments. It’s a risk that appears to have paid dividends. As he explains: “It’s quite widely documented that we had an offer from the PGA Tour and European Tour, as well as the Saudis, but it really wasn’t a comparison for us. The way we look at our schedule, the International Series events, which are ten of our elevated events, are all full-field Asian Tour events. We’re not having to split the field with the European Tour anymore. There’s more prize money and we have total control over what we’re doing, whereas before the European Tour was in control of the co-sanctioned events.

“We feel like we are more aligned with LIV in terms of a partnership. We work with them on the schedule, on field splits and player participation from the highest level as well, like the LIV players who come out and play the International Series. It’s more of an equal grounding.”

There are two key pillars that the investment from LIV and the Saudis has funded. The first is the aforementioned International Series, a globetrotting event series that sees the participation of some of LIV’s stars alongside a full complement of Asian Tour players, and the new season-ending PIF Saudi International worth a total of $5m. Both represent a different level of competition than the tour has ever seen, but prosperity means more than simply greater purse sizes.

As the International Series’ Rahul Singh says, it’s about building the foundations for a player-first tour that elevates golf in Asia and beyond: “I think what the International Series and the Asian Tour more broadly represents is an opportunity to grow globally, to expand the game, to bring in new talent, to create this pathway. It’s to show the young talent that coming back to Asia and playing golf is a real viable option. And from a player perspective, its enhanced prize money, better player services, better courses that we visit, and going to locations that the typical Asian Tour player may not have had the opportunity to visit a few years ago. Part of growing and becoming a better player means exposure to different environments, that’s something else that we provide.

“It’s fair to say that the growth trajectory is high. It’s a commitment and because it’s a commitment, we are not worrying about tomorrow, we’re thinking about what lies five years ahead and so on. That mindset is allowing us to focus on the future, on more holistic goals, and that’s really important.”

There’s more prize money and we have total control over what we’re doing now

For Thant, a once-aspiring young golfer who admits he “didn’t quite make the grade”, leading the Asian Tour to a brighter future is his chance to leave his mark in the professional game. “It’s just part of my DNA. A lot of the guys out on tour are friends that I used to play golf with when I was younger, or they’re kids that have grown up before my eyes. Everybody loves to compete in their own way, so I think this is my way of feeling like a tour player without actually teeing it up,” he says.

“We have a real opportunity here to build a legacy for the Asian Tour, not just as a global golf tour, but as something that people want to invest in because they can see what we’re building here. I don’t want to be reliant on Saudi investment forever. In the next two or three years, I’d like to see us find our feet with more organic sponsors and more partners that want to be part of our journey.”

Thant’s dreams of being a professional may be behind him, but in the years to come he might prove to be one of the most important players in golf.

For more information, see asiantour.com