Morikawa In Agreement With Koepka Over LIV Golf Questioning

Collin Morikawa has branded the LIV Golf Invitational Series a distraction as he prepares for the US Open in comments that echo those made by Brooks Koepka earlier. 

Morikawa, who is making preparations in his bid to win the third Major of his career at The Country Club this week, said: “I know when the tournament happened for LIV, and I wake up Thursday morning, and I'm interested to see what's going to go on. Yeah, it is a distraction, and I think I read something or I saw what Brooks said earlier today. I think he is on to something. We're here at Major championship, and we're here to win the US Open, and we're here to play and beat everyone else in this field, in this great field. That's what it's about.”

Morikawa also likened much of the speculation surrounding the Series to gossip. He said: “I think when you wake up and I'm texting my agent or I'm texting my friend about: ‘Hey, did you hear about this or I'm getting news about this,’ it's fun, it's exciting because it is gossip. Who doesn't like gossip, right? But it also becomes a distraction, and you don't want to be focused on this or that. You want to be focused on playing golf. I would say over the past six months it has been - I'm not going to blame it on any part of my golf game. Put that aside. But it is an extra distraction on thinking about this, thinking about that and worrying about who is going to ask what.”

Earlier, Koepka criticised the media on repeated questions about the Saudi-backed Series and accused reporters of “throwing this black cloud over the US Open.” While Morikawa wasn’t so blunt, like Koepka, he’s keen on staying focused on this week’s tournament.

Morikawa has PGA Championship and Open Championship wins to his name already, but explained that he’s ultimately targeting a career Grand Slam. He said: “I want to win all four, so for me it's not like I put one in front of the other. Now that I've won the PGA, I've won the Open, yeah, maybe I would like to win this one maybe a little bit more than the others, or the other two that I've won. But Majors are awesome. You only get four a year, who's ready to show up, and that's what makes them so great.”

He begins his to bid to win his third of the four Majors on Thursday, where he'll be teeing it up in a group with LIV Golf player James Piot and current US Open champion John Rahm.