Lee Westwood: Rory McIlroy has had a ‘rethink’ on his player criticism

Rory McIlroy thinks that if his fellow international players “really care about their career,” they should be playing on the PGA Tour during the coronavirus pandemic.

Lee Westwood thinks that McIlroy has had a “rethink.”

One week after McIlroy said international players should be competing on the PGA Tour while the European Tour remains shut down, Westwood told Worldwide Golf that only a few of those players are actually eligible for tournaments, and that the rest of the world is “almost treating” the coronavirus more seriously than the U.S. 

“He’s entitled to his opinion, but what Rory fails to explain in there is that only handful of European Tour players were eligible for those PGA Tour events,” Westwood, a native of England, told Worldwide Golf. “Your rank and file European Tour members – the 50th to the 150th in the world – couldn’t get in those events.”

“You listen to people talk about where the Tour is this week in the U.S. and they say Hilton Head is open,” Westwood added. “People are eating in restaurants and they’re wandering around, beaches are crowded, and the rest of the world is just more on lockdown. … I think he – I did send him a text and we chatted about it. He’s probably had a rethink.”

McIlroy had been responding to international player frustration that the world golf ranking was to restart with the PGA Tour’s restart two weeks ago, while the European Tour won’t resume until July 22. The PGA Tour will have played six tournaments before then, which is important given the world golf ranking’s two-year rolling period in which results count toward a player’s ranking, which factors into various forms of playing privileges.

“Very unfair, can’t understand this!” tweeted Matt Fitzpatrick, a native of England who actually has played the PGA Tour’s first three events during its restart.

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McIlroy, a native of Northern Ireland, stayed in his Florida home during the PGA Tour’s three-month break. He said other international players should have traveled to the U.S.

“Look, personally, I – if I were in their shoes and I was asked to come over to the states and shelter in place or quarantine for two weeks before these tournaments, I would have done that because we’ve got – I mean, if you really care about your career and care about moving forward, you should be here, I think,” McIlroy said before last week’s RBC Heritage. “Last week was 70 world ranking points for the winner; this week 74.

“And I get there’s different variables and families and stuff involved, but we all have the means to rent a very nice house in a gated community in Florida, and, you know, it’s not a hardship for two weeks to come over and quarantine. I mean, it’s fine. … Yeah, I honestly don’t understand the guys complaining because there is a solution to it. You can come over here and do what needs to be done.”

Westwood, among the international players who said they would not travel to the U.S,, is now 32nd in the world rankings, one spot lower than he was before the restart. He told Worldwide Golf that it “doesn’t seem fair that the Europeans and South Africans and Australians that play on the European Tour lose out purely because of a pandemic that’s hitting the world.”

“It’s just unfortunate,” he said.