By Frank Pingue
(Reuters) – The coronavirus relief golf match featuring Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks Tom Brady and Peyton Manning will be on May 24 at Medalist Golf Club in Hobe Sound, Florida, WarnerMedia’s Turner Sports said on Thursday.
The sanctioned PGA Tour event, which is being dubbed The Match: Champions for Charity, will begin at 3 pm ET (1900 GMT) and the four golfers will come together to make a charitable donation of $10 million to benefit COVID-19 relief.
WarnerMedia is banking on a matchup featuring two of the most famous golfers of their era alongside two of the all-time greatest NFL quarterbacks competing on the nation’s Memorial Day holiday weekend to be a welcome sight for sports-starved fans.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has caused unimaginable tragedy and heartbreak,” Jeff Zucker, chairman of WarnerMedia News and Sports, said in a news release.
“We’re hopeful this event and platform will help raise meaningful funding for COVID-19 relief, while also providing a source of brief distraction and entertainment for all sports fans.”
The competition, which is being held 2-1/2 weeks before the PGA Tour plans to resume its season, will feature 15-times major champion Woods and Manning up against five-times major winner Mickelson and Brady in Team Match Play.
The golfers will play fourballs on the front nine and a modified alternate shot format on the back nine, where each competitor tees off and then the team plays alternate shot from the selected drive.
Medallist Golf Club opened in 1995 and is the home course to many PGA Tour players including 15-times major champion Woods, who last competed in February and then withdrew from a number of tournaments with a back injury before the PGA Tour decided to cancel a slew of events because of the coronavirus.
Mickelson finished third in the Pebble Beach Pro-Am in early February and missed the cut in his next two starts.
Brady joined the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in March after 20 years with the New England Patriots during which he won an NFL-record six Super Bowl titles.
Manning, who played for the Indianapolis Colts and Denver Broncos, retired in 2016 as the NFL’s all-time leader in passing touchdowns and yards and is the only five-times winner of the league’s Most Valuable Player award.
(Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
