JGTO and OneAsia ante up for Thailand Open
The Japan Golf Tour Organization (JGTO) has intended to co-sanction the Thailand Open and the Indonesia Professional Golf Association Championship with OneAsia Tour.
This is big news for Asian golf. With giants like Japan Golf Tour Organization and OneAsia coming together to make the Thailand Open happen, we can only see golf flourishing at a professional and amateur level.
The Thailand Open is scheduled from the 14th of March through to the 17th whilst players of the Indonesia Professional Golf Association Championship will be taking to field starting March 28 the same year.
Other events included in the preliminary schedule are the Volvo China Open (scheduled May 2 to 5), GS Caltex Maekyung Open (May 9 to 12) and SK Telecom Open (May 16 to 19).
Sang Y. Chun, Commissioner and Chairman of OneAsia, said the co-sanctioning will allow for a much larger purse with the region’s top players participating. He looked forward to the coming season.
“This is a significant development for OneAsia. Since our launch in 2009 our objective has been to build a circuit that brings together the whole of the Asia-Pacific region.
“Furthermore, the Japan Golf Tour Organization is one of the world’s leading circuits and we look forward to welcoming many of the finest players in the game to the Thailand Open and Indonesia PGA Championship”.
The Japan Golf Tour Organization had long hoped to increase influence beyond the archipelago to the Asian region as a whole and this joining of forces is able to do just that.
Shingo Katayama, a prominent name in Japanese golf, was amongst the first to give his blessings to the growing relationship between his country’s Japan Golf Tour Organization and OneAsia.
He said such collaboration was what the younger lot needed and hoped to see more tournaments of the kind being held in the coming years.
The most important function of regional organizations cooperating like this, Katayama explained, was the chance to get to compete with golfers of various nationalities. This, he said, gives lesser golfers that necessary experience to better their skills.
“I hope more tournaments will be held so that more young players will have the chance to compete against the players from overseas”.
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