The Grange Golf Club’s tenure as LIV Golf Adelaide host venue is set to end next February after the breakaway league confirmed last Friday that Kooyonga Golf Club (pictured) will host its flagship event come 2027. The Grange has been home of the highly successful tournament since its inception in 2023, with next year’s event (13-15 February) closing the curtain on a unique chapter in the club’s history, one which has seen the tournament deliver more than $200 million in economic impact to South Australia during that time. 

The Kooyonga announcement comes after LIV and the South Australian Government inked a deal earlier this year to extend Adelaide’s exclusive hosting of the tournament until 2031. At the time it was also revealed that the public access North Adelaide Golf Links was to be redeveloped by Greg Norman, with the tournament to move there upon completion. 

“The current contract extension announced on the final day of LIV Golf Adelaide earlier this year sees Adelaide as the exclusive home to LIV Golf in Australia until 2031, with Kooyonga Golf Club now playing a vital part in this exciting partnership,” Friday’s announcement read. “LIV Golf will continue to work with all stakeholders on the logistics of hosting the world-class competition and world-renowned entertainment acts at this new venue, with final course plans to be unveiled at a later date.”

Situated across the road from Adelaide Airport and 15 minutes from the Adelaide CBD, Kooyonga is perennially ranked among the best courses in the country and currently sits 18th in Australian Golf Digest’s Top 100 Australian courses list for 2024/2025 (only Royal Adelaide ranks higher of the South Australian courses at No.9.). It has a proud tournament history, including five men’s Australian Opens between 1950 and 1972 where the likes of Peter Thomson, Norman von Nida, Ossie Pickworth and Gary Player (twice) all saluted. The club became synonymous with hosting the Jacob’s Creek Open in the 1990s and early 2000s, hosting eight between 1996 and 2008, while it also hosted the Women’s Australian Open in 2018.

The LIV announcement comes just a few months after Kooyonga was confirmed to host the Women’s Open again in 2026 as the tournament returns to a standalone event after being staged alongside the men’s event for the past three years. The news that LIV was also coming made for a pretty excited staff room when Kooyonga superintendent Richard James broke the news to his crew ahead of Friday’s announcement. 

“The opportunity to do an event of LIV’s stature and present your course for a field of that quality doesn’t come around very often,” says James. “The last men’s pro event here was the Jacob’s Creek Open back in the 2000s, so to be able to showcase the club and golf course to a worldwide audience is a huge opportunity. The crew was really excited when we told them the news and it will be an invaluable opportunity for them to grow and experience an event of this magnitude.” continued...
 

Kooyonga will present a much different look for LIV Golf Adelaide which has had the luxury of being housed at the 36-hole Grange site since 2023. The Grange uses a composite of East and West course holes for the tournament course, with many of the non-tournament holes (as many as eight in 2025) used for spectator hospitality zones and car parking. 

Kooyonga by contrast is a 19-hole course on a much smaller site, with LIV organisers confirming at the announcement they are in talks with the local council about accessing other grounds and facilities near the course to help facilitate the event. While there has been some commentary around how a LIV tournament would fit on their site, James has little concern and is looking forward to seeing how it all comes together.

“You look at Grange and they obviously have a much bigger property and everyone has got that build and template in mind, but at the end of the day we are a different property and LIV will build it to suit us and maximise what we have,” says James. “So, yes it will look different. But we are a unique golf course and I’m sure they’ll maximise our strengths and do the best job they can to continue what is a fantastic event.”

While no discussions have been had yet regarding routing and tournament set up, foremost in many fans’ minds will be whether the now famous Watering Hole (12 West at The Grange) can be transplanted into Kooyonga. One potential location is the long par three 15th which can play between 204 metres (from the Black tees) and 164 metres (Red tees).

“For me I think the 15th is the logical one,” says James, who has been Kooyonga superintendent since 2017. “There’s a bit more room around the green and its quite a long par three which means you could play it forward a little which enables you to put some infrastructure around the tee. It’s also in a good part of the course to gain access to, but that’ll be up for LIV to determine. It will be interesting to see the logistics and I’m sure they’ve already started a bit of that planning.” continued...

While the LIV announcement is all the talk of the club, for James, assistant superintendent Matt Gates and the Kooyonga team, there is the more pressing matter of hosting the Women’s Open next March. It was in late June when Golf Australia confirmed that the Women’s Open would return to Adelaide for the next three years starting in 2026 after a highly successful run of five events between 2016 and 2020. James was superintendent at The Grange for that first Open in 2016 and was also in charge of Kooyonga when it hosted in 2018, having moved between the two clubs in August 2017. Kooyonga was scheduled to host the 2021 Open but it was cancelled due to the COVID pandemic. 

Co-sanctioned by the WPGA Tour of Australasia and Ladies European Tour (LET), next year’s Open will be played from 12-15 March and will provide the perfect warm-up for James’ crew who are relatively green when it comes to tournament experience. 

“Since we hosted the 2018 Open, we have pretty much had a full turnover of staff,” explains James. “There is a lot of excitement around the Women’s Open returning and it will be good for the crew to experience that event and get a taste for what a tournament is like. Obviously preparing the course for the men instead of the women will be a little bit different, but having the Women’s Open under their belt will mean they won’t be going into LIV blind.”

Building the foundation for next March’s tournament surfaces begins this weekend when James and his crew kick off their usual October course renovations. From Sunday the course will be closed for three-and-a-half days during which time the couchgrass fairways will be scarified, vertimowed and topdressed. Instead of coring greens, James will run a DryJect unit across them, a lower-impact process which will inject sand channels into the profile. It will then be about bedding everything down before Christmas then returning in the New Year to ramp up preparations. As part of that James has organised a few Monday closures for major maintenance undertakings as the tournament nears.

Story and photos: Brett Robinson