Tiger ends long silence tomorrow
LOS ANGELES, USA (AFP) — Golf superstar Tiger Woods will break his silence tomorrow, speaking publicly for the first time since revelations of marital infidelity launched a tabloid firestorm, his agent said yesterday.
The 34-year-old is to speak tomorrow morning from the clubhouse at the TPC Sawgrass, headquarters of the US PGA Tour at Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.
Agent Mark Steinberg said in a statement that Woods would speak to a “small group of friends, colleagues and close associates” about his past and what he plans next, as well as apologising for his behaviour.
Woods will not take questions, Steinberg said.
“While Tiger feels that what happened is fundamentally a matter between him and his wife, he also recognises that he has hurt and let down a lot of other people who were close to him,” the statement posted on Woods’ website said.
“He also let down his fans. He wants to begin the process of making amends, and that’s what he’s going to discuss. His remarks will be open to a press pool for live coverage. It is NOT a news conference.”
Woods’ long-awaited public appearance will come in the middle of the WGC Accenture Match Play Championship in Arizona, which started yesterday.
Accenture was one of the sponsors that dropped Woods after the scandal erupted around him in the wake of a mysterious car crash outside his Florida home in the early hours of November 27.
Shortly before Woods’ crash, the National Enquirer published a story claiming he had been seeing a nightclub hostess.
After the crash a number of women claimed they had affairs with Woods.
On December 11, Woods announced he would take an “indefinite break” from golf.
Since then speculation has raged as to Woods’ whereabouts, the state of his marriage and just when and where he would make his return.
In January widespread reports placed Woods at a rehabilitation clinic in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, where he was receiving treatment for sex addiction.
PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, who was at the Match Play Championship in Tucson yesterday, declined to speculate on what Woods would have to say, but he welcomed his decision to speak.
“I’m pleased he’s going to make some comments,” Finchem said, adding that Woods had asked to use the TPC Sawgrass facility.
“We were asked to make the facility available and help with the logistics,” Finchem said, although the commissioner said he didn’t know what Woods planned to say.
“I’m not going to assume anything,” Finchem said. “Like everybody else, we’ll learn what he has to say.
“My sense is that this is part of his schedule and what he’s going through. I don’t know what he’s going to say, what he’s going to do after he finishes his rehab.”