Lee Westwood $430,000 in unpaid LIV Golf fines, barred from Senior Open Championship

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One of the biggest names in professional golf, Lee Westwood, has been barred from the Senior Open Championship.

Despite an alliance forming, there is still a lot of ground to make up between LIV Golf players and the governing bodies of golf.

The Senior Open Championship isn’t until July, but one of the biggest names set to play in it, Lee Westwood, will no longer be in the field. His application was rejected because of unpaid LIV Golf fines to the DP World Tour, per the Telegraph.

The R&A allows LIV players to play in the Open Championship. The Senior Open is different. The R&A and DP World Tour run that event. In a letter he received on the committee’s decision, it cited that he had outstanding fines for breaching its conflicting tournament regulations, per the Telegraph.

Westwood paid an initial £100,000 for appearing in the LIV Golf opener last June. He also handed in his membership card. Since then, Westwood has played in 13 LIV Golf events and was one of the names who resigned in the wake of the Tour winning an arbitration hearing this past April.

That hearing permitted the Tour to sanction players who competed in LIV events despite Wentworth HQ not granting release requests.

Despite the groundbreaking announcement from June 6 that LIV Golf, the DP World Tour and PGA Tour would merge, that has not been finalized.

After the alliance was announced, Kieth Pelly, the Wentworth Chief executive, didn’t shy away from stating that any player who wanted to get their membership back for next year would have to pay their outstanding fines.

For Westwood, that would mean roughly £400,000 ($437,000) in unpaid fines.

“I don’t see any reason why I should be ineligible to play in the Senior Open in Royal Porthcawl in July,” Westwood said in an interview with the Telegraph earlier this year.