I GREW up in Melbourne, but I’ve lived in Queensland for the past 50 years during which period I’ve become a proud, passionate and, perhaps, parochial supporter of most things maroon. It saddens me to think that next year we might lose the right to host the Australian PGA, and it frightens me that, once lost, we might not get it back.
Queensland has hosted the Australian PGA for the past 25 years – firstly at Royal Queensland, then at the Hyatt Regency at Coolum, followed by a few years at Royal Pines on the Gold Coast before returning to RQ in 2020.
Apart from the Australian Open it’s our most significant golf event of the year, a highlight of Queensland’s sporting calendar, and a rare opportunity for Queenslanders to see their golfing heroes in person.
With RQ preparing to host the golf tournament at the 2032 Olympics, the course will be renovated next year and won’t be able to host the 2026 Australian PGA. Though there are some wonderfully suitable alternate venues on the Golf Coast, Sunshine Coast and in Brisbane, there’s no guarantee that next year’s event will even be played in Queensland.
Southern states, most notably NSW and Victoria, are already lobbying heavily for the national PGA to be played in their major cities next year – no doubt backing their arguments with the quality of their courses and the old furphy that a late November/early December tournament in southeast Queensland is always going to be vulnerable to lightning and rain storms.
But isn’t that just part of the drama? And aren’t we forgetting that when Queensland picked up the event all those years ago, nobody else wanted it?
In the mid-1990s the Australian PGA Championship was a dead duck. In 1995 they couldn’t find a sponsor and the event wasn’t even played, and officials didn’t know what to do with it until the Queensland Government and Greg Norman’s Great White Shark Enterprises threw the event a lifeline.
I was a board member of the state-owned Queensland Events Corporation at the time and was involved, to some minor extent, in the negotiations. Part of the deal with the Australian PGA was that organisers had to ensure 10 of the world’s top 100 players would be in the field.
In 2000, that final spot was filled by Brandel Chamblee, now a regular US Golf Channel commentator, who told me during the pro-am that the only reason he was there was that his kids insisted on him coming so they could visit Aussie Zoo and, hopefully, catch a glimpse of Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter.
After two years at RQ, following comments from some of the professionals, the event moved to the Sunshine Coast, where it became a favourite destination of the players, and an event of international significance. If it wasn’t for Clive Palmer’s shenanigans, it might still be there.
There’s something special about a tournament being played at the same place year after year – providing, of course, it’s a special destination. That’s one of the reasons the US Masters is such a legendary event.
Right now, we have the chance of making the Australian Open an event of similar standing.
Last month’s Open was a fabulous tournament – made so by the inclusion in the field of Rory McIlroy, everybody’s favourite golfer; watched by a gallery of unprecedented size, enthusiasm and respect; and played at one of the world’s finest golf courses.
The 2026 Australian Open will be played at Kingston Heath, another superb Melbourne golf course. But I’d be surprised if Golf Australia officials weren’t already holding discussions with Royal Melbourne about bringing the next Aussie Open back to that course in 2027. And leaving it there forever.
Just as Brisbane is the place for the PGA, the Australian Open is best played in Melbourne. An Australian Open at Royal Melbourne in early December each year would be an unbeatable combination – one that would attract sponsors, the world’s best players, and the sort of 30,000-strong galleries that made the 2025 Open one of the best played in all of the years.
It would again make the Australian Open an event of true global significance.
Played in tandem with an Australian PGA in south-east Queensland, maybe a new event in Sydney (perhaps the Australian Masters could be reborn), and the LIV tournament in Adelaide in the New Year, Australia would once again become a powerhouse of world-class golf.
And we’d all have a golf tournament we’d be proud to call our own.
ED NOTE: Peter is obviously of the belief the PGA Championship, if not at RQ, should remain in
Queensland. Others think a shift to Sydney, a city which didn’t host a major event this year, would be more appropriate. Where would you like it to be played? Should the PGA move around, if so where to in 2026, and similarly, should the Open set up a permanent home on the Melbourne sandbelt? Let us know what you think.
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