You’d need to be an experienced psychologist to run the rule over Rory McIlroy’s performance in answering questions at today’s RBC Candian Open on the questions surrounding the events of the last 24 hours between the PGA Tour and the Saudia Arabian Public Investment Fund, pointedly not a merger with LIV Golf in McIlroy’s eyes.

You have to hand it to the man, he knew what was coming and in preparing for a big tournament he could perhaps have been forgiven for diving for cover.

But he hasn’t done that throughout this whole affair, so why start now?

Whatever corner Rory may have painted himself into with regard to ongoing future relations with the Saudis and the soon to re-accommodated LIV Golf cohort, it was nothing compared to PGA Tour CEO and now the Head man of the new venture Jay Monaghan.

He was happy to talk of changed circumstances and bright new futures so who could hold the words of anger in 2022 against a man who is still playing at the very highest level and was never going to be privy to the machinations of high finance that were grinding beneath the surface of the game.

It was late on Monday that McIlroy got a text from his friend and PGA mover and shaker Jimmy Dunne to ask could he take a call in the morning.

Then at 06:30 on Tuesday the call came and the detail of the plans were laid out to him.

McIlroy sees this as a new venture into which the Saudi Public Investment fund is investing but over which the PGA Tour will retain operational control.

Jimmy Dunne is one of the names that has been confirmed as sitting on the Board of the new venture so that is clearly the story that was coming from the inside of this deal, at least on the PGA Tour side.

The devil will be in the detail and all the messy stuff about whether golfers who did not take the LIV millions will now be compensated in some way, how the innovations that LIV called their own will be incorporated into the new ‘unified’ elite game, and whether the Tour retains what McIlroy says he wanted to defend as its aspirational nature have all to be determined and will likely take up a substantial amount of time and potentially billions more of Saudi Riyals.

But McIlroy is a clever guy, and very much matured over the past year.

Looking straight ahead he spoke of removing himself from the equation and looking upon this as good for the future of elite professional gome in maybe ten years time.

That’s a damn fine stance for someone in his early 30s, yet perhaps to be fully aware of his own mortality and the reality of how time moves on regardless of the individual.

He is also a realist. “When you look at one of the biggest Sovereign wealth funds in the world and whether you would want them as a partner or as an enemy… well money talks and you’d rather have them as a partner.”

He went on to say that he felt at times like a sacrificial lamb having defended the PGA Tour, damned LIV Golf and all involved and was now being brought back into the same tent.

He sees there as having to be consequences for the players that left the PGA tour and irreparably harmed the Tour.  “We can’t just let that happen, there have to be consequences.”

There are stories of raised voices at a meeting between McIlroy, other PGA Tour Pros and Jay Monaghan on Tuesday evening, but McIlroy did speak highly of Monaghan’s abilities as a business leader.

There are questions still to be answered on the credibility of the sport that rallied the troops, the commercial partners, the broadcasters, and the fans with the language of battle and which now has to sell the language of what many will see as surrender to the inevitable power of money.

There is of course the greater good and the bigger picture and all those other phrases but this was personal and now there are a lot of bridges not just damaged but blown up entirely that need to be rebuilt.

It will be worth hanging onto Netflix for the second season of Full Swing to see the (possibly) more unfiltered and uncontrolled reaction will be across the player base.