The Open Championship Venues For 2023 and 2024 Revealed

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Tournament organizers for the iconic Open Championship have revealed the venues for its championships in 2023 and 2024 respectively. The Royal & Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews has selected Royal Liverpool to stage the 2023 event, while Royal Troon will now host both the 2024 and 2025 championships. Both venues were due to welcome the event a year earlier, but the postponement of this year’s tournament has moved everything back 12 months.

The news will be music to the ears of Northern Irish fans’ favorite Rory McIlroy, who won the 2014 Open Championship when it was last staged at Royal Liverpool. The 2020 Open Championship was due to be held at Kent’s Royal St George’s. However, the calendar reshuffle means that this venue will now play host to the 2021 championship, with the Open then set to return to its spiritual home of St Andrews in 2022.

Martin Slumbers, chief executive of the R&A, said that the governing authorities had been “working closely” with both venues and the “relevant local agencies” to reschedule both events for 2023 and 2024. Slumbers said that he was “grateful” to the “clubs” and “partner organizations” for “showing flexibility” in accepting the revised tournament scheduling.

While hopes abound for an infinitely brighter 2021 golfing calendar, attention will soon turn to preparations at Royal St George’s for next year’s 149th Open, which is scheduled for 15-18 July, 2021. This spectacular Links course remains the only course on the Open Championship rotation to be located in the southern half of the UK. It has staged the Open 14 times since 1894, when J.H. Taylor prevailed to win the first prize of £30. The winner’s purse is set to be somewhat bigger in 2021, with the next Open champion set to bag a cool £1.935 million – more than double the purse when it was last staged here in 2011 of £900,000.

The unlikely winner that year was likeable Northern Irishman Darren Clarke, who upset the odds to prevail with a winning score of five under. Royal St George’s is by no means a course that’s known for its high winning scores. In fact, Sandy Lyle managed to win the 1985 Open with a score of two over par.

Royal St George’s is certainly one of the most unforgiving Open courses. With a host of blind or partially unsighted shots required, players with the greatest technique and mental fortitude are most likely to prevail here. It’s why clever players like Darren Clarke, Ben Curtis and Sandy Lyle have managed to finish top of the pile in the past. This explains why Rory McIlroy is once again the bookmakers’ favorite to win his second Open Championship in 2021. FOX Bet, which is now licensed to offer legal wagers to golf fans in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Colorado, has priced McIlroy at +900 to claim his fifth golf major.

It’s also impossible to discount the current world number one Dustin Johnson. The American, who recently secured his first green jacket by winning the 2020 Masters, is a two-time major winner and has come remarkably close in the past to winning at Royal St George’s. In fact, he was tied for second place at the 2011 Open in Sandwich, finishing joint-runner up with compatriot Phil Mickelson, some three shots behind winner Darren Clarke. Johnson is priced a shade longer than McIlroy at +1000 to go one better than his 2011 efforts in 2021.

Jon Rahm is surprisingly priced as third favorite for the 2021 Open at +1200. This may be due to his impressive 2020 season, having held the world number-one ranking for four weeks. However, his record at the Open’s Links courses has been chequered to say the least. His best finish came last year when he tied for 11th.

Looking further down the field, Louis Oosthuizen looks like a great early value bet. The South African, who has excellent Links golf pedigree having won the 2010 Open at St Andrews, is a +4000 shot and priced at longer odds than the likes of out-of-form Jordan Spieth (+3300). Even Bryson DeChambeau, who is likely to lack the finesse to prevail at Royal St George’s, is priced much shorter than Oosthuizen at +1600.