The Open Championship has a Monday Qualifier: Here’s How it Works

It’s hard to believe that the Open Championship is just a week away, but with Royal Birkdale ready and waiting it’s time to start turning our attention toward the players in the field. With Final Qualifying in the books, there are few remaining opportunities for entry to the championship.

Among the last exemption categories is one that you might not recognize: the Last-Chance Qualifier. Similar to the Monday qualifiers we know and love, the one-round event takes place at the start of championship week itself, on July 13. Contested between a group of just 12 players, it will serve as the last doorway to the Open’s first tee.

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The full field for the qualifier was announced on Tuesday. Adri Arnaus, Wesley Bryan, Joe Dean, Sam Easterbrook (a), John Gough, Marcus Helligkilde, Angel Hidalgo, Charles Huntzinger, Matt Moloney (a), Aldrich Potgieter, Matti Schmid and Andrew Wilson will tee it up on the Southport links early Monday morning.

Here’s everything you need to know about the Open Championship’s new Last-Chance Qualifier, and how those players found their way into the field.

How Does it Work?

This part is pretty simple. It’s just an 18-hole stroke-play event between the 12 qualified players with only one spot into the major championship up for grabs. Should there be a tie after the round, a standard hole-by-hole playoff will go until an individual winner is determined. The other players will be added to the reserve list for The Open.

Players will tee off in groups of three beginning at 7:30 a.m. on Monday, July 13.

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Who Plays?

There are a few ways to get a slot among the lucky 12 vying for a spot at Royal Birkdale for the 154th Open Championship, some with priority over others. With the capped number of players, some categories listed below may not be applied, should the field be full before they are reached.

The exemptions into the Last-Chance Qualifier are listed below in order of priority.

(1) The leading two non-exempt players in the Official World Golf Rankings (OWGR) as of Monday, July 6

Image: Getty Images

These two spots will go to Aldrich Potgieter (OWGR No. 77) and Matti Schmid (No. 78). Johnny Keefer (No. 81) and Michael Thorbjornsen (No. 83) were their closest chasers.

The first two spots in the Last-Chance Qualifier are filled.

(2) The runner-up in the 2026 Amateur Championship (provided they remain an amateur)

This one will go to Matt Moloney, the rising junior at Georgia who fell to eventual champion Stuart Grehan on the 36th hole of their final match.

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Already, the third spot is filled.

Image: Getty Images

(3) Players who did not secure a place in The Open having been in a playoff at Final Qualifying

West Lancashire was the lone site of Final Qualifying that had a playoff, where three players battled it out for one slot. Matthew Jordan walked away victorious with a tap-in birdie on the second playoff hole, which left amateur Sam Easterbrook and Joe Dean–both Englishmen like Jordan–to try once again at the Last-Chance Qualifier.

With two more spots taken, we’re up to five players teeing it up on June 13.

(4) Players who finished one position behind the competitors who secured a place in The Open at Final Qualifying

This is where things get a bit complicated. With just seven spots remaining in the Last-Chance Qualifier and 13 players who finished just one stroke outside of the number needed to qualify at their respective sites, obviously not all can be included. The good news is, there is a solution to this. The bad news? It’s not simple.

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First, the Final Qualifying sites are sorted by their strength of field, a measure determined by the R&A. They pick one player from the strongest field, then proceed down the list until they’ve selected a player from each venue. They then repeat the process until the field is filled or they’ve run out of players.

The next issue comes with the fact that at multiple Final Qualifying locations, players were tied for 6th, one position outside qualifying. To determine which player should be selected first, they sort the tied players by OWGR ranking.

Essentially, they pick the best player from the strongest field that finished one position outside of qualifying. They will then do the same at the site with the second strongest field, and so on.

Because there were seven slots available and only four sites, this meant that the player with the highest OWGR finishing one spot outside of qualifying at each site should be safe. Angel Hidalgo, John Gough and Adri Arnaus are indeed in the field, but Brandon Thompson Robinson, the highest-ranked at Burnham & Berrow, must not have been able to accept the invitation.

The remaining four of these slots went to Wesley Bryan, Marcus Helligkilde, Charles Huntzinger and Andrew Wilson.

(5) Players who were tied for a qualifying place in Open Qualifying Series events (excluding Scotland) but did not qualify due to a lower position in the Official World Golf Ranking, or by losing in the play-off for 1st place in the OQS event.

Now we’re getting really complicated. This is actually not dissimilar from how the process for (4) worked, but the good news is that we don’t need to go in depth on this one. This year, the 12-man field will already be full by the time we get to step five.

Without a doubt, the Last-Chance Qualifier is bound to kick off the week of The Open Championship with a lot of drama, as the twelve players will vie for a potentially life-changing exemption into the year’s final major.

*This page was first published on July 3, 2026. Last Updated on July 7, 2026.