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A new high tech golf league is soon going to tee off and behind it are goals too. Most elite names Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy. Now if you have followed Tiger Woods career and life in the public space, you would agree that he has been controversies favorite child. From being in the middle of the storm regarding his affairs to getting into car accidents, he's undergone his fair share of trials and tribulations. Now Tiger Woods, a legendary golfer, and Rory McIlroy, who has had his own share of golfing success, have come together for a brand new venture that is already. Facing enough heat even before takeoff? Now when I say New Venture, I mean their version of new. Now I'll explain. This project also has some of America's most renowned faces who have walked in with different sporting resumes to back this project. Steph Curry, the NBA star, the William sisters, the most prolific tennis siblings are some of the big superstars who have decided to attach their stardom to this project. So what are Tiger Woods and Rory Mcilroy's grand plans then for this? The new venture. The plan is an indoor league that will be televised. The competition is in partnership with the PGA Tour and the league will start on the 9th of January in 2024 at the Sophie Centre at Palm Beach State College in Florida. The arena can host about 1600 spectators. Now the venue has a custom built arena that is. Tech Infused, meaning it will have golf simulators, with players hitting tee shots in a massive screen that is around 20 times larger than a standard screen. For shorts lesser than 60 yards, golfers will switch from the screen to a game complex called the Green Zone. This Green Zone again harnesses technology with actuators and jacks following, allowing the slope of each hole to be changed. So rather than using the usual courses and holds, it is a rather different experience. That all sounds super techie and fancy and great, except this venture has already attracted controversy before a property of After PG unveils the format of this league, questions and eyebrows were raised. There are many quarters that are claiming that this ambitious project is a rip off and a complete copy of the Liv Golf tournament. Here's what renowned golf writer Alan Shipnuck said. He said in a quote. A-Team based breakaway league using an unorthodox format to quote new and younger fans. Hmm, feels like I've heard this before. But there has been a heated debate on social media with fans of the sport weighing in and calling the Woods McElroy Golf League a total copy of the Liv Golf Tournament. Now just to give you a bit of a background, Liv Golf is a Saudi based league tournament that was announced in 2021 and held its inaugural season. A year later the business tycoon Craig Norman ran the show and this tournament has been financed by the Saudi Public Investment Fund. Liv is a team based competition even though Tiger Woods and Mcilroy's project is going to be played. In an indoor setup, its format is also similar, with six teams set to feature in the inaugural season, and all of these teams have been sold to private owners. When Liv Golf was launched as an alternate to the PGA Tour, it sparked off a massive debate with a lot of questions raised about breaking away from the gentlemen's game. It allowed more payouts and appearance fees for those involved in it. Even though the prize money of TTGL is not known just yet, it is apparent that with the kind of names attached to the leak, it won't be an underwhelming reward and the elite names would look to claim those payouts. Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy have of course, Needless to say, vehemently opposed to the notion of. This being a plagiarized version of Liv Golf, now here's why this is strange and ironical. Tiger Woods, in fact, is known to have slammed the golf stars who in fact left to join the more lucrative Liv Golf, questioning their motive and also expressed his loyalty towards the PGA Tour. Woods and Rory even went to the extent of asking the Saudi League CEO to shut shop and step down. Now, it was during that phase when the Liv Golf and PGA Tour merger was about to take place that Rory has famously known to say, and I quote, if Liv Golf was the last place to play golf on Earth, I would retire. That's how I feel about it. Now many prominent golfers came out crying horse to stop this. One of them was multiple major championship winner, PGA Tour and Masters title winner Phil Mickelson, who later had to backtrack and toe the line as. I've really enjoyed my time on the PGA Tour. I've I've had some incredible experiences, some great memories, and I have a lot of strong opinions on things that should and could be a lot better. One of the mistakes I've made is is voicing those publicly, so. I will. I will really make an effort to keep those conversations behind closed doors going forward. I think that's the way to be the most efficient and and get the most out of it. The merger, of course, meant no course correction and the players had to go ahead with this. So now Tiger Woods starting something which is rivaling the PGA Tour in some sense seemingly along the same lines as the Liv Golf, which he himself strongly opposed back then, seems rather strange. Woods and Rorys animosity for Liv Golf had multiple reasons. One was the seemingly breaking away from the conforms of what golf has always been, an individual sport, not a team game. In many ways, he believed the league would disrupt traditional. Ironically, his own league is now emulating Liv Gold's approach. It would be pertinent to add here that just someone's back. Tiger Woods agreed to join the tour policy board as a sixth player director, so it's very interesting that despite all this hue and cry months preceding that to bring down Saudis air live golf tournament, Would himself has decided to launch a clone. But the key take away here is the sport places players superstars really on a high pedestal, and for fans to come to terms with an act that seemingly is adverse to an image that the sporting achievements have created is sometimes hard to come to terms with. And that's what Tiger Woods, who has been in this very place so many times, now finds himself in once again. It's the dream of every cricketer. The ultimate glory. Few managed to keep their date with destiny, but for many it's been heart breaks and a cross to bear. The Holy Grail is here in India. I'm Rupa Ramani and 1st post brings you the ringside view. We bring you the Cup of Dreams Cricket World Cup coverage like never before.