Louis Oosthuizen became the latest player to deal LIV Golf a big blow by announcing on Wednesday that he will be leaving the league ahead of the 2027 season.

It is getting harder to see LIV being able to fill its roster for next year with the number of players announcing their decision to walk away increasing regularly.

Until now, none of the South African Southern Guards team had spoken about their plans regarding whether they intended to be involved with LIV 2.0. However, it would be no surprise if the likes of Dean Burmester and Branden Grace decided to quit following Louis Oosthuizen’s announcement.

Once again, Oosthuizen’s statement announcing his exit really does not reflect well on those who decided to join LIV Golf.

Why Louis Oosthuizen has apparently decided to leave LIV Golf

Oosthuizen alluded to the fact that he felt that he had more to give the game. Thus, he needed to be able to decide his own schedule.

“I realised I have a lot more in me, and my biggest fear was that the schedule on LIV 2.0 would be tough to manage,” he wrote.

“I feel I have a few more years of good, competitive golf left in me, and the only way to be really sharp and competitive is through a schedule I control.”

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Golf is a selfish sport, so few eyebrows may be raised by the 2010 Open Championship winner’s comments. However, those comments do not look good at all when you factor in what Oosthuizen said about being a part of the team ahead of the inaugural LIV Golf South Africa event earlier this year.

“I think for me, I’m more invested in that the team does really well every week and that we play well, and me trying to do my part and have a good score,” he told the media.

“But it has changed my mentality about what LIV is all about. For all the years being pros, always individual, and now being part of a team with three good friends is more important than the individual for me.”

It is hard to make the case that Oosthuizen’s primary focus was his LIV team given that he has now chosen to walk away to focus on his own game.

It also must not be forgotten that Oosthuizen was the captain of the team. No one should have had more determination to lead the Southern Guards into a new era.

How often Louis Oosthuizen played on the DP World Tour following his move to LIV Golf

Oosthuizen is far from the only player to backtrack on previous comments when it concerns LIV. But the part of his statement that attracted the most interest online was his claim that he wanted to have more control over when he plays.

The big problem with Oosthuizen’s comments is that LIV controlling the schedule is not something new for 2027. Since its launch in 2022, the league has expected all of its players to feature at every single event.

And it is not as though Oosthuizen has reached the end of his tether trying to balance playing on LIV Golf and the DP World Tour.

Since the start of the 2023 season, the only DP World Tour event not sponsored by Alfred Dunhill that Oosthuizen has played in has been the Mauritius Open.

He won the event in December 2023 and has not been back.

The majority of those associated with LIV have spent the last five years trying to convince the rest of the golfing world of a reality that never existed.

They wanted to grow the game, they said. Team golf was the way forward, they argued. Some even suggested that those reporting earlier this year that LIV’s future was uncertain were speaking ‘absolute nonsense’.

It is remarkable that even as many abandon the LIV Golf ship, they continue to make statements that completely contradict what they have said about the league before.

Oosthuizen has become the latest. He almost certainly will not be the last.