Golfing great Greg Norman reportedly called on as go-between for Trump administration and Australia

Golfing legend Greg Norman was reportedly called on to act as a go-between for Donald Trump and the Albanese Government.

The Aussie sporting great, who counts Mr Trump as a friend, famously came to the former Turnbull government’s aid in 2016 the day after Mr Trump’s first electiony.

Mr Turnbull’s staff found themselves in a mad scramble at the time after Mr Trump’s surprise win, with no one in the administration having contact details for the new president.

Norman came to the rescue, allowing Mr Turnbull to be one of the first leaders to speak with him after his victory.

In 2018, Norman played 18 holes of golf with Mr Trump in a successful bid to persuade him to exempt Australia from crippling steel and aluminium tariffs.

On Thursday, the Sydney Morning Herald reported that Norman had again helped in smoothing relations between the two countries.

“There was a request put through, yeah,” Norman said.

He reportedly declined to reveal details of the request, including who made it and where it came from.

But he said the result was “positive”.

“It worked … we’ll just leave it at that,” he said.

Norman reportedly said his assistance was not related to an interaction between Mr Trump and Australian Ambassador Kevin Rudd at Mr Trump’s Palm Beach golf club before his inauguration.

Dr Rudd has had a nervous few months after it was revealed that he had deleted old X posts criticising Mr Trump on the day that the US President won the 2024 election.

The post, published in 2020, contained a picture of Mr Trump and labelled him “the most destructive president in history”.

After the post was deleted, Dr Rudd’s office issued a statement saying it was done “out of respect for the office of President of the United States”.

“This has been done to eliminate the possibility of such comments being misconstrued as reflecting his positions as ambassador and, by extension, the views of the Australian Government,” the statement said.

Earlier in 2024, Mr Trump told UK MP Nigel Farage in an interview that Dr Rudd was “not the brightest bulb”, warning that if he was hostile when Trump was voted back in he would “not be there long”.

Mr Turnbull spoke last week, ahead of Mr Trump’s second inauguration, urging Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to “stand up” to Mr Trump in his dealings with the US.

“The big mistake that people make with Donald Trump is to pretend the best way to deal with him is to suck up to him. You don’t win his respect by doing that any more than you win the respect of any bully you suck up to,” he told The Nightly.

“To deal successfully with Trump, you need to win his respect, and you do that by standing up for yourself and looking after your own interests just as assiduously as he’s looking after his.

“If you’re the Prime Minister, you have one responsibility, which is to defend and advance Australia’s interests.”

Mr Turnbull was bullish in a leaked transcript of a conversation he had with Mr Trump back in 2017, convincing the President to stick with a deal the Australian Government had struck with the previous Obama administration on resettling asylum seekers.