Outgoing R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers has insisted that Donald Trump's return to office as the President of the United States will have no impact on The Open Championship returning to Turnberry.
The Ayrshire course last hosted The Open in 2009, and has not been considered as a venue for the final major championship of the season since being bought by Trump in 2014. The last major event to take place at Turnberry came at the Women's Open, which headed to Trump's setup in 2015, a year after the takeover.
Since then however the iconic Scottish course has been left on the sideline by the R&A, and according to Slumbers, there are no plans to return any time soon.
"We will not be taking any events there until we are comfortable that the whole dialogue will be about golf,” Slumbers told Golf Channel this week. “That situation is something we’re still not comfortable with at the moment, but that could evolve in the coming years.”
Slumbers seems keen to ensure the focus stays away from off-course politics, and instead at the championship at hand. “When you look at the major championships, we want the whole thing to be purely about the golf course and to be purely about the players that are competing on it,” he added,
"And to make sure that there’s no sort of media noise that detracts away from the fact that this is a golf championship, the oldest and original golf championship, and that should be the single source of the media coverage. I think that’s really important if we’re going to preserve the strength of our events.”
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Despite Slumbers' update, it appears some of golf's biggest names feel the Trump course has what it takes to play host to The Open once again. Speaking to Mirror Sport last month, Trump Turnberry general manager Nic Oldham said: "We had Sir Nick Faldo, Greg Norman, John Daly, Scottie Scheffler, Sam Burns, all play it pre or post The Open.
"And every single one of them said it was set up for an Open and could have played it in the condition it was that week. That was our intention - we had a huge number of people playing that week. The members have said they’ve never seen it play as well. And that’s our intention, week in, week out, from May until September, every year from now on.”
More than happy to play into the hands of Open bosses, he added: "We are always looking to get The Open and we will do anything the R&A want us to do. If they said they were in a position to award us The Open again then we sit down with them, as what would normally happen, and look at what needs to be changed for the modern game of golf."