Cam Smith To Face Phil Mickelson In LIV Team Championship Knockouts
The match-ups for the first day of the LIV Golf Team Championship at Trump National Doral in Florida have been revealed with Cameron Smith against Phil Mickelson a standout singles match as the Australian's Punch GC face Lefty’s HyFlyers GC.
Smith has been one of the outstanding players of 2022, first on the PGA Tour, and then with LIV Golf where he won the Chicago event. Mickelson has struggled by comparison. However, with six Majors to his name, he is undoubtedly a player who thrives on the biggest occasions and cannot be written off.
The quarter-finals of the Team Championship sees the teams seeded 5th to 12th face off in two singles matches and one (alternate shot) foursomes match. Other intriguing match-ups include Smash GC’s Brooks Koepka’s singles match against Niblicks GC’s Harold Varner III. Meanwhile, Joaquin Niemann, who will be hoping to help his Torque GC team progress against Cleeks GC, faces former World No.1 Martin Kaymer in another singles match.
Earlier in the week it was revealed that Majestics GC captain Lee Westwood had swapped roles with Ian Poulter for this week's season-closing finale. It was speculated that the reason for the swap may have been to allow Poulter to play in a singles match given his unbeaten track record in Ryder Cup singles matches, with Westwood in the foursomes. While Poulter is playing a singles match, against Iron Heads GC's Kevin Na, so is Westwood, who faces Sihwan Kim, adding confusion as to why the change was made after Westwood was captain in the previous six tournaments.
The winners from the quarter-finals will progress to the semi-final, where the top four seeds – including Dustin Johnson’s number-one seeded 4 Aces GC - will enter the competition.
All 32 players will play simultaneously in a shotgun start and matches will be played until a winner is found. Each match winner receives one point. The first team to reach two points goes through to Saturday’s semi-finals.
Below is the full list of match ups for the opening round.
LIV Team Championship Day One Match-Ups
- Smash GC vs Niblicks GC
Foursomes: Jason Kokrak/Chase Koepka vs Turk Petit/Hudson Swafford
Singles: Brooks Koepka vs Harold Varner III
Singles: Peter Uihlein vs James Piot - Majesticks GC vs Iron Heads GC
Foursomes: Sam Horsfield/Henrik Stenson vs Phachara Khongwatmai/Sadom Kaewkanjana
Singles: Ian Poulter vs Kevin Na
Singles: Lee Westwood vs Sihwan Kim - Torque GC vs Cleeks GC
Foursomes: Adrian Otaegui/Scott Vincent
vs Graeme McDowell/Richard Bland
Singles: Joaquin Niemann vs Martin Kaymer
Singles: Jediah Morgan vs Laurie Canter - HyFlyers GC vs Punch GC
Foursomes: Bernd Wiesberger/Cameron Tringale
vs Matt Jones/Wade Ormsby
Singles: Phil Mickelson vs Cameron Smith
Singles: Matthew Wolff vs Marc Leishman
