Adelaide to Host Australian Open on Greg Norman-Designed Course from 2028 in $45M Redevelopment Deal

South Australia has secured the men's Australian Open for 2028, and the announcement landed in Adelaide this week at a delicate moment for the project behind it. The tournament will be played at North Adelaide Golf Club, on the edge of the city's CBD, on a course being redesigned by Greg Norman as part of a $45 million investment.

The deal is a rotation, not a one-off. Between 2028 and 2034, the club will host three men's and three women's Australian Opens. The 2028 men's event will be only the second held outside Victoria or New South Wales. The country's golf leaders gathered in Adelaide for a strategy session and the announcement.

The backdrop is LIV Golf. After the success of its events in Adelaide, the South Australian Government backed a plan to redevelop the south course at North Adelaide with a view to hosting the breakaway tour from 2028 through to the end of 2031. That plan is now clouded: Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, the PIF, has withdrawn its enormous financial support, and a LIV event in Louisiana scheduled for this month has been postponed. The tour is estimated to have cost $10 billion over five years and has lost millions since 2022, with only a handful of events, Adelaide's among them, considered financially viable. The Australian Open win gives the course an anchor tenant whatever happens to LIV, and with it some protection against criticism of the spending.

Premier Peter Malinauskas was blunt a day earlier, saying the state does not "owe LIV anything." He said South Australia will welcome news that the tour is seeking new partners and would be "at the front of the queue if it stacks up," but will not pay for anything that fails to deliver. He called the past events a massive success for the state. Cameron Smith, the 2022 British Open champion, said on Wednesday he was confident LIV would return to Adelaide in 2027, though the premier's position and the PIF's exit leave that in question. LIV chief executive Scott O'Neil said a new business plan involving outside investors is coming, and that about a dozen interested parties have called, a mix of private equity, family offices and high-net-worth individuals. He said the tour needs its roughly 40 media partners, who broadcast in more than 200 countries, to stay on board. Players including Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm and Smith face questions about their futures.

Malinauskas has said the redeveloped course will remain a public facility. In February he said South Australians would pay public-course prices for a layout at a standard for which members elsewhere pay thousands of dollars a year. Interstate and international visitors would pay more, with the premier saying there would be a South Australian taxpayer price and a rest-of-the-country price, and that the government would charge as much as it could get away with. In announcing the Open, he said residents would be able to play, walk or cycle through the parkland course for most of the year.

For Golf Australia, the value is certainty. Chief executive James Sutherland said the organisation has not always had the stability to build the event to its potential, and that fixed venues, dates and partners will let it court sponsors and players with a longer-term view. He pointed to the 2025 men's Open at Royal Melbourne, which drew more than 113,000 people, and to the most successful women's Open in the event's history at Kooyonga. Rory McIlroy was a star attraction at Royal Melbourne last December and will return to Victoria for this year's tournament under a two-year deal.

Victoria is not being sidelined. Sutherland said Adelaide's 2028 slot exists because the Presidents Cup will be played in Melbourne that year, and he is optimistic about continuing the partnership with the Melbourne sandbelt courses. What to watch now is whether LIV lands new investors, and how the visitor pricing at North Adelaide is set.