The PGA Tour said on Thursday that after a meeting this week with U.S. President Donald Trump it was closer to reaching a deal with the Saudi backers of LIV Golf that would help end the years-long divide in professional golf.

LIV Golf has signed a major UK broadcast deal with ITV which will see the league shown on free-to-air TV for the first time, following a technical fault on the app

Players from the Saudi-backed breakaway LIV Golf Series will be able to qualify for the Open Championship for the first time after a historic agreement was reached

To the dismal list of indignities visited upon men’s professional golf — profound division, cutthroat rancor, naked greed, rampant entitlement — we can add brazen obsequiousness, evidenced by Thursday’s statement in which PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and player-directors Adam Scott and Tiger Woods had to fluff Mango Mussolini’s ego to help secure government approval for a deal to reunify the sport.