Ronaldo to Neymar: Saudi Arabia is changing football one player at a time

Saudi Pro League has signed at least 22 big names from European football since January. The contracts are also bigger than usual. How is it doing so, and why?

"I am here in Saudi Arabia, I am Hilali"

That's what Neymar Jr said on Tuesday in a video posted on the social media handles of his new club, Saudi Arabia's Al Hilal. With one more renowned footballer moving to the West Asian country, the interest around its domestic football league has reached a new peak.

In the past six months, the Saudi Pro League has signed at least 22 players from Europe. This might not seem like big news in itself, but what makes it interesting is that most of these players were considered to be among the best talents the game has ever seen. Albeit most of them are at the dusk of their professional careers, the list includes names like Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema, Sadio Mane, Riyad Mahrez, Fabinho, Jordan Henderson, Roberto Firmino, Kalidou Koulibaly, and N'Golo Kante.

 

Al Ettifaq, which recently signed Henderson, appointed former Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard as its coach after he had a not-so-impressive season coaching Aston Villa.

Splurging big bucks

Most of the deals have offered huge sums of money to the players. Benzema has been offered a two-year contract for $436 million. Ronaldo will earn $215 million every year till 2025. Kante signed a four-year deal for $109.78 million per year. Neymar is reportedly expected to get $100 million every year.

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When compared to the clubs in Europe, these wages are extravagant and not many clubs in the West can afford to offer such contracts.

Moreover, some of the deals that could not go forward also involved large sums of money. Kylian Mbappe and Lionel Messi, both of whom were approached by Al Hilal, were offered contracts of $332 million and $436 million per year.

Al Hilal had also approached Luka Modric, offering a three-year contract at $215 million per year. 

But where is the money coming from?

The seismic change in club football started when in June this year, Saudi Arabia's $770 billion Public Investment Fund (PIF) announced the takeover of the four largest teams in the Saudi Pro League — Al Nassr, Al Hilal, Al Ittihad, and Al Ahli.

The fund, controlled by Saudi's crown prince Mohammed bin Salman and managed by Yasir Al-Rumayyan, said the deals would be completed in time for the start of the 2023-24 season in August.

It was decided that the fund would hold a 75 per cent stake in these four teams, with the other 25 per cent controlled by a non-profit organisation.

The board of those clubs will comprise seven members, five of which will be appointed by PIF and the other two by the non-profit.

In 2021, the PIF also purchased Newcastle United, a Premier League club. In the same year, it also launched LIV Golf to compete with PGA Tour and signed some of the world's highest-ranking players there, too.

Apart from sports, the fund has holdings in some of the biggest companies in the world. These include Saudi Aramco, Boeing, Citigroup, Facebook, Disney, and Uber. In India, it owns a 2.32 per cent stake in Reliance's Jio Platforms.

The PIF allows the league to make huge offers to the players. Moreover, the Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules, which limit the amount of money one club can spend in a season, do not apply to the Saudi Pro League.

Why is Saudi Arabia even doing it?

According to reports, this is being seen as a part of the country's "Vision 2030". Under this, the MBS administration has fixed some targets that need to be achieved by the end of this decade.

According to a report by The Athletic, among other things, one aim is to make the Saudi Pro League one of the top 10 leagues in the world. The second is to triple its market value to $2.1bn through a combination of commercial revenue and private-sector investment.

Moreover, several reports have claimed that the country is also expected to bid to host the Fifa World Cup in 2030. It has already won the right to host the 2027 AFC Asian Cup and is also bidding to host the 2026 AFC Women's Asian Cup.

Saudi's interest in football has also jumped after Qatar, one of its geopolitical rivals, hosted the Fifa World Cup 2022 successfully. Qatar is a smaller country with an inferior heritage of football as compared to Saudi Arabia.

The official announcement, however, says that this is being done to "further boost" the "existing momentum and major uptake of sport in Saudi Arabia", as quoted by The Athletic.

With Neymar Jr., Ronaldo, Sane, Benzema and Kante donning their jerseys, the Saudi Pro League will surely attract a new audience, especially from Asia. But the questions of whether it will be able to compete with European football and, if so, how long will it take, remain unanswered as of now.