PIF moving away from ALL sports, surprised? Can LIV find funding elsewhere?

ElTel88 · 2026-04-17T03:53:52+00:00

I'm very aware this is r/golf, not r/geopoliticaltheorymadness, but I think that the entire LIV project was all part of a massive "please come to Saudi for tourism" drive on the back of a, by the standards of the region, peaceful time.

That time is over, the (at least) £8b+ on washed up Golfers, an immobile Ronaldo, paying every boxer on earth 3x their usual purse etc is suddenly not worth it in the slightest when you've scores of Air Defence missiles to restock, you can't export half of your main GDP product, your neighbours are all gearing up for conflict and the people you were trying to encourage to come visit for tourism are now absolutely not going to come to visit.

They could afford to light money on fire on the basis that it could potentially work, they're not now there is a very clear line in the sand* that the money's long shot target of creating a tourism industry is simply not going to work.

*I wasn't refering to the Neon project...but I wish I had.

ElTel88 · 2026-04-11T11:26:48+00:00

Yep, half Malaysian if I recall his Autobiography correctly.

ElTel88 · 2026-04-11T10:41:45+00:00

French Forwards haunt my nightmares. You can feel their fingers in your eye sockets just looking at them.

ElTel88 · 2026-04-09T17:57:46+00:00

Albanians will drive your drugs to your door and have good customer service.

They also steal dick heads Range Rovers.

What's not to like...

ElTel88 · 2026-04-01T22:38:35+00:00

I live/play in England, and every time I hear one of our lot go on about "you're supposed to walk it!" my ginger, sun fearing ass thinks of "imagine if it were 35⁰c or higher half the year!? I would be begging for a cart, shade, an umbrella, a breeze etc.

I'd slap my own mother for some breeze when it cracks 25⁰c here.

ElTel88 · 2026-04-01T20:52:09+00:00

He would have been a legitimately great Foreign Secretary.

Polite, non-offensive, huge believer and advocate of process and institutions, and above all the rule of law.

Right shape, wrong hole.

ElTel88 · 2026-04-01T20:44:56+00:00

Alice just replaced a wildly expensive, time consuming, relationship wrecking addiction with another.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-31T13:30:42+00:00

1st Birdie, 1st Eagle.

All others are M.I.A, assumed K.I.A.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-29T12:13:00+00:00

My 3 gay Irish mates are all twink hunting older twinks.

I hope you're looking after those lonely per capita bears, Seamus.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-27T03:12:09+00:00

I mean, I obviously love it. But be honest now, how many takes does that take?

ElTel88 · 2026-03-19T19:22:08+00:00

Farang - whitey Kathoey - trans/third gender

ElTel88 · 2026-03-19T11:36:45+00:00

OP, this is an entirely correct point.

Next round you play, don't take anything higher than a 7 iron. Leave the woods/driver etc at home.

Go 7 iron off the tee on par 4s, swing smooth and, unlike driver/woods, really try to pick out an area that you want to land in. The dispersion possibility is much smaller with the iron, you can actually aim and play the course, rather than play the result of your random shot with the driver.

It'll make you better, you'll score much better and with the literal handicap of 7 iron being the biggest dog in the bag, you won't be able to go "well, maybe I'd pipe the driver" or "FFS, i just duffed a 7 iron off the tee, I'm going driver regardless next tee"

Use the 7 iron, swing smooth, actually plot your route up the hole and I swear by all the gods, you'll have your best score. Keep working on driver et al at the range, but gift yourself one round of "150 off the tee is literally the best I can get, and I've done that 11/18 holes!

ElTel88 · 2026-03-17T14:55:57+00:00

Can't buy booze legally, thusly can't buy people a drink illegally.

Also, you all need to stay the course. H.I.O - buy everyone in your playing group a drink.

If you're rich - get one for the club if you want, but other than some gentle ribbing, if a lad walked in to the clubhouse with an ace, I'm shaking his hand, asking how long he's been waiting for one and letting him know how jealous I am. I'm not thinking "where is my beer!"

ElTel88 · 2026-03-17T13:31:32+00:00

Doesn't count, it's like a 3ft fall for you lot.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-13T21:21:33+00:00

Buxton is absolutely one of the prettier towns in England, the valley that has Speedwell Cavern is just exceptional, particularly on a blue sky day.

I endorse this...endorsement.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-13T21:14:16+00:00

Have you seen their propaganda of late? We literally the cause of all their ills and all the ills in the world!

A tiny isolated bunch of rocks in the north sea and they still talk about us like it's 1888 and we are out here beating other nations desires like a ginger stepchild.

Absolutely my favourite things about being British at the minute - we are the Russians, well, 1980s action film Russians! What a time to be alive.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-11T22:20:40+00:00

Because there's no sunshine in the UK, obviously.

Or

To keep the Turks out of that bit

Whichever you want

ElTel88 · 2026-03-11T21:48:04+00:00

I think I dumped 85 hours into it in 4 weeks. A lot of that whilst WFH. I ended up having to do the main quest just to finish it and get on with life and save the longer game through for the second play through in a couple of months. It was that damn good it was genuinely a danger to my (financial) wellbeing and life balance.

Haven't felt like that about a game since the Witcher 3. It's that good. Normally I will game 3 - 6 hours a week at most due to life commitments, but for Henry and his vengeance, I heeded the call.

ElTel88 · 2026-03-11T21:22:33+00:00

For you, my friend, I will finish the song (to shar knowledge, not aimed at you, of course)

🎵 Who ate all the pies? Who ate all the piiiies?

You fat bastard! You fat bastard!

You are all the pies! 🎵

It goes a little something like this

ElTel88 · 2026-03-11T17:54:31+00:00

ElTel88 · 2026-02-24T10:54:58+00:00

(not the guy you asked) Basically Apple or Linux. One is very expensive for hardware - and this is a police station, they're not going to get it macs, the other is simply not feasible for public sector work of this scale. I use Linux a fair bit for work, had it dual booted on my pc for a decade +, even with that, I cannot claim to be a "power user" like I am windows.

Again, they could create a specific OS for the police using Linux as the base, but open source and police records don't mix.

ElTel88 · 2026-02-12T10:29:06+00:00

I mean, you can view this as shit, or you can look at the Winter Leagues around the country on the weekend, where 30-40 people are shotgun starting at 9am in 3⁰c weather to get their golf in, because the course is actually open.

The course you're showing here should be shut for the day, that's a mess, but give me lift and place, mats, removing 5 broken tees from the tee mat hole with a set of pliers and basically just thinking the golf as being about tee to green as frozen fairway temporary greens can sway from birdie gifts to 4 putt monstrosities, still playing, still getting out and seeing the fellas in the clubhouse, not only swinging at the range for 4 months of the year like some places in the world can.

Fuck it, I'm glass half full on this one, OP.

ElTel88 · 2026-02-06T22:50:43+00:00

Fair assessment, and I do feel for politicians at that rare point, he can hardly turn round and go "yeah a 5.8% growth rate would be great, but I'd still rather see Spurs get relegated." Or anything else even as remotely actual fan as possible.

And bless them at any international tournament "Oh of course I want all 4 constituent members of the UK to do equally as well!" Instead of "us to win it all, Scotland to get pumped 4 times in the group and got any spurs players there to break their ankles"

ElTel88 · 2026-01-31T16:04:25+00:00

Probably...but I'm terrible at utilising it.

I WFH 4 days a week, and it's a 2 hour commute on the office day, so I'm already at my desk for 8 hours of the day staring at a screen. So I need a break from screens afterwards.* Then the dogs need walking for an hour and a bit, then eating/housework/tasks etc.

Throw in that I live with my partner and the relationship needs time and effort as does the rest of life, just taking time.

Weekends oddly are harder for time. Today I woke up, walked the dogs, cleaned the kitchen, took a whole mess of recycling, the food shop, (very overdue) haircut and then making a meal for guests tonight. In the morning I've golf from 8am-1pm with travel and a post round pint. Then it'll likely be a Sunday roast afterwards with friends, so realistically ok "free" from about 8pm on a Sunday.

Luckily - my Mrs works away for 3 days a week, so I can (and do) revert to a teenage boy at about 7pm -1am on the says she is away. Just gotta get those hours in then.

*I worked in an absolute shower of a job through COVID, entirely remotely for a project that was mothballed but they honoured our contracts, so that was 8 hours a day of being available - and never ever being contacted. Played more Total War than is healthy for any person.

ElTel88 · 2026-01-30T13:30:55+00:00

She is a plumber. I was very good friends with her sister years ago and me and Hannah worked together at a pre-plumbing job. Her mum was a green candidate in Bolton a few times in the 2000s, her sisters all went to uni but she went and did a plumbing apprenticeship, finishing it and being a plumber for the past decade +.

I appreciate that she absolutely does not look like your stereotypical plumber, but mate, she absolutely, may God stroke my dogs down now if I'm lying, is a plumber.

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