Out of the Rough: LIV Golf UK (2025)

With the 2025 majors completed with last week’s The Open Championship, those representing LIV Golf in Northern Ireland will join the rest of the tour in the UK for this week’s LIV Golf UK.

This week’s host, the JCB Golf & Country Club also played host to this event a season ago and will play host for a second consecutive season.

JCB Golf & Country Club is in Uttoxeter, United Kingdom.

Including this week, there are just four events left in the 2025 LIV Golf schedule, including the end-of-the-season LIV Golf Michigan Team Championship.

The Field

LIV Golf saw a record 20 players represent the Tour at last week’s The Open Championship as they’ll head across the Irish Sea to rejoin the rest of the Tour.

Jon Rahm won this event a season ago for his maiden LIV Golf victory at -13 over the likes of Joaquin Niemann, Cameron Smith and Tyrrell Hatton who came in at -12.

Niemann, with his four victories on the season, keeps pace of the season-long standings, with a lead of 12.64 points over second place Rahm.

Ram holds a 23.06 point lead over third place Bryson DeChambeau as the front-running trio hold a considerable margin over the rest of the Tour. 

Legion XIII (Rahm, Hatton, Caleb Surratt and Tom McKibbin) currently hold a 24.66 points lead over second place Crushers GC (DeChambeau, Paul Casey, Charles Howell III and Anirban Lahiri.) 

It’s also getting to that point of the season to monitor the “Drop Zone,” or those risking losing their LIV Golf status. Notable names in that area include Ian Poulter, Andy Ogletree and Mito Pereira as the first third outside of the cut line. 

Luis Masaveu, Chieh-Po Lee and Henrik Stenson are currently the first three within the cut line. 

The Course

The JCB Golf & Country Club is one of England’s newest golf courses, having been opened in 2018.

It was the work of Lord Bamford and Robin Hiseman and in its short history has already hosted events on the Rose Ladies Series, the Legends Tour and LIV Golf.

The location is ideal for the course as it sits in the middle of England, crafted from established woodland and farmers’ fields. The ground was not easy to work with, with the clay-based soil offering drainage problems. In the end, 400,000 cubic-meters of earth was moved to produce the course

The course, owned by global construction company JCB and constructed on the grounds of its headquarters, plays as a par-72 at 7,308 yards.

Although the idea was to not only construct a golf course to help with marketing, development of the brand and a place to bring clients, the company still wanted to develop a world-class golf facility - and that they did.

Off-the-tee, golfers will be welcomed by wide-fairways that are lined with tall fescue but due to their width, won’t be brought into play unless a tee-shot is extremely wild.

Being a new course, the length of today’s game was built in, as the tips don’t feel pushed back or added like most professional venues, but one’s built into the course from the jump.

There are a number of lakes and streams throughout the course that do come into play.

There are plenty of scoring opportunities on this course but there is risk involved in nearly every shot. As with most Hiseman designs, there are safer routes to attack this golf course, but the scoring opportunities will not come as easily.

Out-of-the-gate, the par-four first hole has water on the left affecting both the tee shot and the approach into the green.

The third is a severely doglegged and the par-three ninth plays sharply downhill to a green located in what was once an arboretum.

The par-four 12th has a stream in play with a green protected by a stone wall.

The par-three 17th is the course’s signature hole. It plays well over 200-yards into an island green.

The Weather

As of the time of writing this, the golf-gods may allow for some dry weather, as the week leading in features a large chance of precipitation each day. Currently, Friday calls for just a 15-percent chance of precipitation, Saturday a 20-percent chance and Sunday a 30-percent chance. Temperatures will be at their highest on Friday at 72-degrees before dropping to 69-degrees on Saturday and 68-degrees on Sunday. Winds will begin at 11 miles-per-hour on Friday before peaking at 14 miles-per-hour on Saturday and settling to 13 miles-per-hour on Sunday. 

Key Stats

• Greens in Regulation Percentage (GIR%)

• Putting Average

• Average Driving Distance

• Scrambling

• Birdie or Better Percentage

Betting Card

• David Puig (18/1)

• Tom McKibbin (35/1)

• Jinichiro Kozuma (65/1)