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Augusta National Golf Club The Masters Greg Norman ARCHIV FOTO Augusta Georgia Untited States of America *** Augusta National Golf Club The Masters Greg Norman Archive Photo Augusta Georgia Untited States of America
Imago
Augusta National Golf Club The Masters Greg Norman ARCHIV FOTO Augusta Georgia Untited States of America *** Augusta National Golf Club The Masters Greg Norman Archive Photo Augusta Georgia Untited States of America
Some moments in sport refuse to stay in the past. At Augusta National, they have a habit of walking back onto the screen in a green jacket.
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Nick Faldo was at the 2026 Masters, not as a competitor, but as a contributor for Sky Sports, offering analysis from the grounds he once dominated. The six-time major champion left his long-running CBS Sports broadcasting role in 2022. Thirty years on, the 1996 Masters remains one of the most dramatic occasions Augusta National has ever staged. And there was Faldo, on screen, in a green jacket, as if the calendar had barely moved.
Jeff Eisenband, a widely followed sports media figure, shared the Golf Channel footage on X and put it simply: “Imagine you’re Greg Norman, just trying to settle in and watch The Masters today, and you see Nick Faldo in the same shirt he beat you in 30 years ago.”
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Imagine you’re Greg Norman, just trying to settle in and watch The Masters today, and you see Nick Faldo in the same shirt he beat you in 30 years ago pic.twitter.com/8hA8KSS7im
— Jeff Eisenband (@JeffEisenband) April 10, 2026
Norman had built a six-shot lead over Faldo heading into the final round, having opened with rounds of 63, 69, and 71. The green jacket felt inevitable. But the game flipped, and the back nine happened. Norman’s round unraveled with bogeys on 9, 10, and 11, followed by double bogeys at 12 and 16, leading to a disastrous 78. In stark contrast, Faldo’s brilliant 67 on a tough Sunday completed an 11-shot swing, the largest in Masters history.
Norman told a bunch of reporters afterwards, “I played like a bunch of [expletive]. I didn’t get the job done.”
Faldo had embraced Norman on the final green, later admitting he felt sympathy in the moment. As for Norman, he accepted his defeat with public grace. And for a while, both seemed to have made peace with the history.
Three decades later, the wound has been reopened, this time by Norman himself. Just days before the 2026 Masters, he sat down with The Telegraph and revisited his long-standing feelings about Faldo. The timing couldn’t have been sharper. It has reframed the moment entirely, with Faldo now set to appear on screen at Augusta in the green jacket, on the very course where he dismantled Norman all those years ago.
The post went viral immediately, and fans weren’t kind to Norman.
Golf fans react to Faldo’s green jacket appearance
“For years, I had a lot of sympathy for Greg, but now not so much,” one fan wrote.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Greg shared that Faldo had said some really nasty things about him during his time at LIV, and that he has no respect for someone who gives their opinion on something in that manner without knowing both sides.
Greg added, “I’ll bear a grudge if somebody crosses paths with me, says something derogatory, tries to screw me over.”
The trigger, you may ask, was Faldo’s comments on LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed tour which Norman has been instrumental in launching. Faldo described LIV as a “fail-free tour” and says it makes players go soft, to which Norman responded to Faldo’s remarks as “interestingly stupid.”
The goodwill Norman built over decades hasn’t disappeared entirely, but for many fans watching in 2026, it has definitely worn thin.
“Norman threw his away… apparently he threw up all over it!”
The sharpest troll in the thread needed no elaboration, as it was a direct reference to Norman’s infamous collapse, where his six-shot lead vanished in a final-round 78. The ultimate sting is that three decades later, Faldo still has his green jacket, while Norman doesn’t.
Not every fan in the thread was there to pile on Norman. Many were simply enjoying the moment for what it was. The image of Faldo on screen in that jacket with the same T-shirt, on the same course, needed no commentary. For a certain corner of golf’s audience, it was the most entertaining 30 seconds at the 2026 Masters. Fans chimed in with comments like “This is incredibly petty… and I love it,” and “Epic Burn.”
However, Norman, for his part, said he would probably have a look at the Masters on Sunday. “We know what that back nine can throw up,” he said. “It threw up the Great White Shark, himself, on at least three occasions, but I still love the place regardless of all that’s gone on.”
Thirty years on, even Norman can laugh about it. The internet, however, is still working on that part.
