Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia who plays in Macau for something that Liv cannot offer

Various top players from Liv Golf are Tee in Macau this weekend, not for the prize money, but for a golden ticket.

Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia, Adrian Meronk and Carlos Ortiz are among the 17 LIV golfers playing in the Macau event of the Asian Tour’s International Series for an opportunity to play their way to the open championship at Royal Portush. The Macau event is part of the R&A qualifying series and publishes places in the 153rd Open for the top three finishers who are not already exempt for the open championship.

“This is an important week,” said Garcia in a press conference before the tournament. “It is a great tournament, it is a very good field, and also with those three places for grabbing for the open championship, it is important. It’s my favorite major, so I would like to be in it again not playing the last few years. So I’m going to give it my best chance this week.

“It is clear that we all like to play in the Majors and be part of them and give ourselves a chance. So to get the chance to qualify here with these three top places, it is huge and it only shows the growth of the Asian tour and how important it is with the quality of players we have here. So it should be a great week.”

Added Reed: “I have the feeling that you have the opportunity to qualify for a major, it just gives you extra motivation to go out and to have a little more drive to go out and try to make those putts and play your best game. Because they are the four events that we always try to play at the end of the day.”

After the third round of Saturday, Reed and Ortiz are at the top at 16. Jason Kokrak is in third place at 13, while Garcia is six back of the Reed and three back of third place.

Last year, Reed played in the Masters and PGA championship before missing the US Open and Open Championship. Garcia played in the Masters and US Open. He had played in 22 straight opening before he missed the iterations of 2023 and 2024.

In February, the R&A revealed an exemption that he will give to the top player in the Liv Golf Individual Rankings that has not yet qualified after the LIV Dallas event at the end of June.

Garcia is currently third in the individual rankings of Liv Golf after his victory in Liv Hong Kong. The two players who are for him – Joaquin Niemann and Jon Rahm – have already qualified for the open at Royal Portush, so he is currently in a good place to protect an exemption as Dawnt’s big season.

However, Garcia has to play much more good wave to earn the exemption, with Sebastian Munoz, David Puig and others close behind him in the rankings and various events left before the closing date of the R&A.

A good Sunday round and third place in Macau can all change that for Garcia.

With Reed and Ortiz in pole position to land two of the three exemptions, Garcia Kokrak, Dominic Foos and Lucas Herbert has to detect and pass to hit his ticket back to his favorite major.