2020 Open Championship
The 2020 Open Championship was scheduled to be the 149th Open Championship and would have been held 16–19 July 2020 at Royal St George's Golf Club in Sandwich, England. It was to be the 15th Open Championship played at Royal St George's, and the first since Darren Clarke won in 2011. Alterations to the course since 2011 include changes to bunkers on the 4th, 5th, 7th, 17th and 18th hole.
On 19 March, the R&A released a statement regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, stating they were examining a range of scenarios for staging the championships, with the focus on proceeding as planned, but also considering other available contingency options. On 6 April, the R&A announced the Championship was cancelled for 2020; it was the first time since the Second World War that the event was not held.
Tournament
The 2020 Open Championship was scheduled to be the 149th edition of the tournament and held at Royal St George's Golf Club. It is located in Sandwich Bay, a long sweeping inlet of the sea between Ramsgate and Deal, on the east coast of Kent, England. The coastal area consists of sand flats with their associated salt marshes and coastal sand dunes. These conditions are well suited to links golf, with Prince's Golf Club and Royal Cinque Ports Golf Club, both previous Open venues, found immediately north and south of St George's.Royal St George's is the only venue on the current rota located in Southern England. The 2020 tournament is the 15th edition held at the venue, having first hosted in 1894, when it became the first club outside Scotland to host the championship. The previous edition held at the venue was in 2011, won by Darren Clarke. The closest large city is London, which is located about 70 miles north west of the venue.
The tournament is run by the R&A, and was scheduled to be included in the 2020 PGA Tour, 2020 European Tour, and 2020 Japan Golf Tour calendars under the major championships category. The tournament consists 72 holes of stroke play competition held over 4 days, with 18 holes played each day. Play is in groups of 3 in first 2 days, and groups of 2 in the final 2 days. Groupings are assigned by the organisers on the first 2 day, with each player having one morning, and one afternoon tee time. On the final two days, players tee off in reverse order of accumulated score, with the leaders last. After 36 holes, only the top 70 and ties remain in the tournament and compete in the third and fourth round. If more than one player has the best score after all four rounds, then a three-hole playoff is used to determine the winner, followed by sudden death if necessary.
Anyone who did not qualify via exemption or the Open Qualifying Series, and has a handicap of 0.4 or lower may enter regional qualifying, and subsequently final qualifying where 12 players qualify for the Open. The 12 regional qualifying venues were scheduled to be Alwoodley, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Burhill, Caldy, Fairhaven, Frilford Heath, Kedleston Park, Minchinhampton, Moor Park, Northamptonshire County, and Rochester & Cobham Park in England, Panmure in Scotland, and County Louth in Ireland. The four final qualifying venues are Notts, Prince's, and St Annes Old Links in England, and Fairmont St Andrews in Scotland.
Ticketing and spectator experience
The previous record at attendance at Royal St George's was 183,000 but organisers expect the 2020 edition to exceed 200,000. Friday, Saturday and Sunday tickets sold-out well in advance, with a few Thursday tickets still to be sold.In preparation for the Open, the local station has had the platforms extended to accommodate 12 carriage trains. There is a dedicated camping and glamping area, called The Open Camping Village, which has capacity for 2,200 people. The local town has a Sandwich in bloom initiative to try and encourage much more tourist activity than in 2011.
Media
The 2020 Open Championship was to be televised by Comcast in both the United Kingdom and the United States, domestically in the UK with the Sky Sports brand, and in the United States by their Golf Channel brand, including broadcast network coverage on weekends.Venue
Royal St Georges tasked golf course architects Mackenzie and Ebert to make alterations to the course in preparation to the 2020 Open Championship. Large bunkers at the 4th and 7th holes, and a large bare sand area to the left of the 5th hole were restored. Two bunkers to the left of the 17th green were replaced by a swale and bunkering was altered on the 18th hole. Improvements were also made to the practice facilities.Course layout
Field
Each player is classified according to the first category in which he qualified, but other categories are shown in parentheses.;1. The Open Champions aged 60 or under on 19 July 2020
Mark Calcavecchia, Stewart Cink, Darren Clarke, John Daly, David Duval, Ernie Els, Todd Hamilton, Pádraig Harrington, Zach Johnson, Paul Lawrie, Shane Lowry, Rory McIlroy, Phil Mickelson, Francesco Molinari, Louis Oosthuizen, Jordan Spieth, Henrik Stenson, Tiger Woods
- Eligible but were not expected to enter: Ian Baker-Finch, Ben Curtis, Justin Leonard
;3. Top 10 finishers and ties in the 2019 Open Championship
Tony Finau, Tommy Fleetwood, Rickie Fowler, Tyrrell Hatton, Brooks Koepka, Robert MacIntyre, Patrick Reed, Lee Westwood, Danny Willett
;4. Top 50 players in the Official World Golf Ranking for Week 21, 2020
;5. Top 30 on the 2019 Race to Dubai
Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Rafa Cabrera-Bello, Jorge Campillo, Paul Casey, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Sergio García, Justin Harding, Benjamin Hébert, Marcus Kinhult, Kurt Kitayama, Romain Langasque, Li Haotong, Mike Lorenzo-Vera, Joost Luiten, Victor Perez, Ian Poulter, Jon Rahm, Erik van Rooyen, Matthias Schwab, Matt Wallace, Paul Waring, Bernd Wiesberger
;6. Last three BMW PGA Championship winners
Alex Norén
;7. Top 5 players, not already exempt, within the top 20 of the 2020 Race to Dubai through the BMW International Open
;8. Last five Masters Tournament winners
;9. Last five PGA Championship winners
Jason Day, Justin Thomas, Jimmy Walker
;10. Last five U.S. Open winners
Dustin Johnson, Gary Woodland
;11. Last three Players Championship winners
Webb Simpson
;12. The 30 qualifiers for the 2019 Tour Championship
Abraham Ancer, Patrick Cantlay, Corey Conners, Bryson DeChambeau, Lucas Glover, Charles Howell III, Im Sung-jae, Kevin Kisner, Jason Kokrak, Matt Kuchar, Marc Leishman, Hideki Matsuyama, Chez Reavie, Justin Rose, Xander Schauffele, Adam Scott, Brandt Snedeker
;13. Top 5 players, not already exempt, within the top 20 of the 2020 FedEx Cup points list through the Travelers Championship
;14. Winner of the 2019 Open de Argentina
Ricardo Celia
;15. Playing members of the 2019 Presidents Cup teams
An Byeong-hun, Adam Hadwin, Joaquín Niemann, Pan Cheng-tsung, Cameron Smith
;16. Winner of the 2019 Asian Tour Order of Merit
Jazz Janewattananond
;17. Winner of the 2019 PGA Tour of Australasia Order of Merit
Ryan Fox
;18. Winner of the 2019–20 Sunshine Tour Order of Merit
J. C. Ritchie
;19. Winner of the 2019 Japan Open
Chan Kim
;20. Winner of the 2020 Asia-Pacific Diamond Cup Golf
;21. Top 2 on the 2019 Japan Golf Tour Official Money List
Shugo Imahira, Shaun Norris
;22. Top player, not already exempt, on the 2020 Japan Golf Tour Official Money List through the Japan Golf Tour Championship
;23. Winner of the 2019 Senior Open Championship
Bernhard Langer
;24. Winner of the 2020 Amateur Championship
;25. Winner of the 2019 U.S. Amateur
Andy Ogletree
;26. Winners of the 2020 European Amateur
;27. Recipient of the 2019 Mark H. McCormack Medal
Cole Hammer
;28. Winner of the 2019 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship
Lin Yuxin
;29. Winner of the 2020 Latin America Amateur Championship
Abel Gallegos
;Open Qualifying Series
The Open Qualifying Series consists of twelve events from the six major tours. Places are available to the leading players who finish in the top n and ties. In the event of ties, positions go to players ranked highest according to that week's OWGR.
| Location | Tournament | Date | Spots | Top | Qualifiers |
| Australia | Emirates Australian Open | 8 Dec | 3 | 10 | Matt Jones, Takumi Kanaya, Aaron Pike |
| Africa | South African Open | 12 Jan | 3 | 10 | Jaco Ahlers, Marcus Armitage, Branden Grace |
| Singapore | SMBC Singapore Open | 19 Jan | 4 | 12 | Kim Joo-hyung, Ryosuke Kinoshita, Richard T. Lee, Poom Saksansin |
| United States | Arnold Palmer Invitational | 8 Mar | 3 | 10 | Joel Dahmen, Danny Lee, Keith Mitchell |
| Japan | Mizuno Open | 31 May | 4 | 12 | |
| Ireland | Dubai Duty Free Irish Open | 31 May | 4 | 12 | |
| Morocco | Trophée Hassan II | 7 Jun | 1 | 5 | |
| Canada | RBC Canadian Open | 14 Jun | 3 | 10 | |
| Korea | Kolon Korea Open | 28 Jun | 2 | 8 | |
| United States | Travelers Championship | 28 Jun | 2 | 8 | |
| Scotland | Aberdeen Standard Investments Scottish Open | 12 Jul | 4 | 12 | |
| United States | John Deere Classic | 12 Jul | 1 | 5 |
;Final Qualifying
The Final Qualifying events were to be played on 1 July at five courses covering Scotland and the North-West, Central and South-coast regions of England. Three qualifying places were available at each location.
;Alternates
To make up the full field of 156, additional places are allocated in ranking order from the Official World Golf Ranking at the time that these places are made available by the Championship Committee.