Which they’ve already announced they’re going to do.
Saudi Arabia FA interested in joining UEFA Champions League (Bloomberg)
- Thread starter Samid
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Wondered why it took so long for someone to mention this. Also laughed a little reading this.The bit that kills me is 'Benzema, Neymar and Henderson'
FFP isn't there to ensure "the dominance of European football". It's there to ensure a level playing field where clubs can't just spend well beyond what they bring in. We know for a fact that this is barely enforced.
One kid seeing dollar signs doesn't really change the trend of it being older players going there for one last payday.
Ok we will see then. But I think the Mastercard ad "There are some things money can't buy; for everything else, there's Mastercard" applies here as well. You can't buy football culture and atmosphere you have to develop that. I don't think buying some players and then letting them play in a third division setting will make you the center of the footballing world. It all feels very artificial right now.
I wish the Super League had just happened.
We all know Mancini is partial to a few petrodollars. It was probably an easy sell.
What they’ve invested thus far is a fraction of what they’re going to invest, seriously.
People (in general) are not grasping what’s happening here with the SPL, at all.
As is often the case when sweeping, sea changes occur - people on the most part react after something has happened, and don’t even see it as it is happening.
Seeing people still referring to the SPL as a ‘glorified retirement league’ etc really sets off alarm bells, because it’s clear that as the landscape is changing, people are desperate to cling on to a previous reality that isn’t accurate any longer.
It will happen if Uefa accepts the Saudi winners in. The only reason it was stopped from happening was due to UEFA having the moral upper hand when compared to our current european set up.
Yep, and for fans for thinking 'Sky' (who sold the game out) are on their sides.
We know our league and AFC Champions League are shit so can we join you guys for some free exposure. We know we're never really going to make it on our own!
Yeah feck off! Once the players get bored in Saudi Arabia and the novelty has worn off and they're playing in front of crowds of 2000, the experiment will be over. Less than 500 spectators for a top-flight football game? Ridiculous!
Are they proposing to ditch the AFC Champions League and just join ours or to play in both?? Stupid idea.
Yeah feck off! Once the players get bored in Saudi Arabia and the novelty has worn off and they're playing in front of crowds of 2000, the experiment will be over. Less than 500 spectators for a top-flight football game? Ridiculous!
Are they proposing to ditch the AFC Champions League and just join ours or to play in both?? Stupid idea.
indeed. Said it at the time that football needs to break away from UEFA.
They can replace Spanish teams, who are apparently going to be forced to pull out
I guess than they will be barred from playing for National Team in World cup/ Euros?
Spanish FA are asking UEFA to ban them?? Is this what LVG called horny football masochism??
I feel sorry that young people never experienced normal football like we ”older”did.
It's funny that all it is taking is one league outside Europe (and all uefa financial constraints) flexing its muscles like this and some are all in for going back to the exclusionary super league idea. Something that was led by those who would almost certainly have embraced any rich enough non-european teams/leagues over allowing smaller European league teams a fair chance at competing.
And posters in this thread claim no one shows up at Saudi games.
More cheer than Man City winning the CL and the treble.
I think if it does happen only one team should be allowed as it incentivizes their own league whilst not toppling the UCL with overinflated fees to remain competitive. Does make you question why they purchased Newcastle if the plan all along was to imbed their own league into prestigious European competition.
Maybe Newcastle was a gauge to see that the west wouldn't be as strong minded against it's ownership as originally anticipated.
Maybe Newcastle was a gauge to see that the west wouldn't be as strong minded against it's ownership as originally anticipated.
People are saying not to consider it a retirement league - that said, I've heard they are close to signing Sergio Ramos and I've also heard he actually went to elementary school with Luis Rubiales's mother. The delay in the contract signing has been because he has been in the church trying to convince her to eat some paella and jamón ibérico!
When they spent trillions of petrodollars on pointless war equipment, no one in the West wondered how useful it actually was.
Now they are investing in soft power that is ridiculous compared to what they have invested in hard power. It's not even worth mentioning. Suddenly you seem to be worried about the Saudis and wonder how sensible this waste of money actually is!?
For their circumstances, the soft power is available at ridiculous prices and also has the nice side effect of entertaining your own people.
Even if the SPL makes several hundred million losses every year, even after 2030: who says that they are necessarily interested in profit?
I don't think MBS will care that couple hundred million. That's how much he spends on paintings.
Many hope that at some point they will lose interest in it. But why should they? Football is a global phenomenon and too effective for their agenda for them to lose interest. It's far more important to them than the couple hundred million you pay for the SPL, if at all.
Now they are investing in soft power that is ridiculous compared to what they have invested in hard power. It's not even worth mentioning. Suddenly you seem to be worried about the Saudis and wonder how sensible this waste of money actually is!?
For their circumstances, the soft power is available at ridiculous prices and also has the nice side effect of entertaining your own people.
Even if the SPL makes several hundred million losses every year, even after 2030: who says that they are necessarily interested in profit?
I don't think MBS will care that couple hundred million. That's how much he spends on paintings.
Many hope that at some point they will lose interest in it. But why should they? Football is a global phenomenon and too effective for their agenda for them to lose interest. It's far more important to them than the couple hundred million you pay for the SPL, if at all.
If people from outside Asia start to massively consuming the Saudi League products (streaming, news, merchandising, tourism, etc), I can see them joining in in the long run. They would probably have to change from AFC to UEFA though, but as some pointed Israel already opened a precedent. Football is a business and is more tied to the entertainment industry than to sports industry, and Saudi League adding some more millions of extra viewers would be seen as a good value in a business perspective.
But football is also about tradition, history, rivalries and no matter how much money you spend you don't have those in Saudi Arabia. It will never get traction in Europe unless they join European competitions.
You really think English, German, Portuguese, Brazilians, Italians or Argentinians will give a damm about Al Hilal against Al Nassr? European or South American clubs, cities, countries have decades even centuries of rich history and bitter rivalries. No billions poured into a soulless league will change that. You can't instill passion on people so they follow a certain sport that has no tradition and historial in a country. You just had a country pay supporters in the last world cup ffs.
Just see our own country as an example. You have rabid 3 big club supporters, who only care about their club, which also kills the competitiveness of our league due to the self centered nature, do you think anyone gives a damm about the Saudi League? We just had our arguably biggest player in history join AL Nassr and no one gives a shite. No amount of stars or pseudo stars bought will change that. People want the derby wins, the underdog cup runs, the regional clashes, beating the Spanish, the Germans, the English, the bragging rights, the taunts, the laughs, the tears, things that matter.
Al Nassr can come here and buy Gonçalo Inácio, Pedro Gonçalves, Diomande or Whoever they want for their Saudi Super League presented by McDonald's and I will still follow and root for Sporting till I die.
100% about the part of football being something that is an important part of history and somehow helped some countries to create an identity. I actually have a club per country that I support because I always loved football since very young and in the old times there was a lot of leagues in open channel : Man Utd in England, Athletic in Spain, Palmeiras in Brasil (clearly influenced on my teen years by Sepultura and Faith No More who used to wear Palmeiras shirts on concerts), etc, etc.
The old school supporters like us couldn't care less about Al Nassr or Inter Miami. I myself only saw highlights when they are on the news, never went to youtube to search and watch Saudi League or MLS highlights, good grievance.
But the truth is, the new generations follow a lot the cult of personality. They will follow that player/manager everywhere, and the truth is that thanks to Messi in Miami and Ronaldo/Benzema/etc in Saudi Arabia, a lot of millions of sheeps are now consuming Saudi Football / MLS products. Just watch this thread and you'll see that a lot of people are actually starting to watch the games or at least following them live! The youtube views of Saudi League are now an average of 180k+ per video, when before they could barely get a couple of thousands.
Inter Miami has now millions of views per video (Messi clearly won the popularity contest on this league trade) and had to ask for suppliers to produce more merchandising because it's sold out!
Inter Miami stadiums are overbooked and people actually leave the stadium when Messi is substituted. We cannot underestimate that a lot has changed, and many millions of people now support personalities ahead of clubs.
The Saudis are perfectly aware of this: that's why they are trying to buy as many high profile players as possible, because that's what "the fans of the future" want.
As I said, this only depends on people: if people outside the middle east start consuming Saudi Football, they will get where they want.
Americans having no soul or culture doesn't equate to the rest of the world and Messi is a complete outlier in terms of pull, too.
The average football fan doesn't care about the Saudi league, and I doubt they will.
The league is just too unusual for people to follow, if it happens it will probably be mostly asians, as I'm sure it won't be europeans or southamericans as they have their own teams with lot of rich history in their own countries. And that isn't gonna change just because Saudi royalty buy a lot of famous european or southamerican players.
Money can buy success, but it can't buy real passion.
People leaving the stadium when Messi is subbed in the MLS just shows that americans are still way behind in terms of football passion, and that Football as a sport is still way behind others sports in United States like American Football and Basketball.
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Now sentencing people to death based on their tweets, retweets and YouTube content.
https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/08/29/saudi-arabia-man-sentenced-death-tweets
Country like any other, nothing to see here
https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/08/29/saudi-arabia-man-sentenced-death-tweets
Country like any other, nothing to see here
Just horrible. Wonder what's the reaction from Newcastle fans? They obviously don't care as long as the money keeps flowing in. English fans hypocrites shocker.
And Ronaldo to go there and promote this is unforgivable. I was already very critical of him for the sad egotistical show he put up in the world cup and now he's actively endorsing this. Very disappointed in Ronaldo and I don't think I'll ever get over this.
I definitely don't agree with that. But one should also be fair and mention who these people are, such as, Awad al-Qarni, Salman al-Odeh, Ali al-Omari and Safar al-Hawali. And how much chaos and mischief they have caused in the Middle East with their knowledge. Find out what "Takfiris" are and what extremist ideology they represent. Many "jihadis" refer to these scholars. This is hate speech and they would face similar threats in the USA as well. And if you researched in more detail you would know they are all backed by Qatari "Muslim Brothers". Exactly these Qataris, by the way, who will soon be in charge here. And now?
Anyway, I think politics and sport should be separated. Otherwise, things would not end well for western countries either. In the USA (Where Messi went) for example, concentration camps are operated. The torture facilities at Abu Ghraib were also not long ago. There, for decades, life has been made hell for critical journalists who have uncovered truths about war crimes by the US Army. Whistleblowers are brutally persecuted. In Israel, for example, critical journalists are simply executed on the street. They don't even bother to hide it. Why is nobody talking about this?
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Literally all your posts are about whitewashing Saudis, did you really sign up here to serve us this whataboutist bullshit “yes they sentence teenagers to death in Saudi but don’t forget about how hard whistleblowers have in the US”? Embarrassing and ridiculous, I hope you at least have a skin in the game and not do this out of sheer idiocy.
And obviously you think politics and sports should be serparated
Literally all your posts are about whitewashing Saudis, did you really sign up here to serve us this whataboutist bullshit “yes they sentence teenagers to death in Saudi but don’t forget about how hard whistleblowers have in the US”? Embarrassing and ridiculous, I hope you at least have a skin in the game and not do this out of sheer idiocy.
And obviously you think politics and sports should be serparated
Either I condemn both parties or just let it be. All European states claim to be states based on the rule of law, but only ever condemn one and never the other. How often was Kashoggi mentioned and how often the journalist Shireen Aqla, who reported critically about the Israeli government and was executed in the street last year? I don't know a politician who has even once taken Shireen Aklah in his mouth. And it was quickly swept under the rug by the media.
Why is Kashoggi's life worth more than Shireen's?
It's obvious that something is wrong here.
All of the kings of Saudi Arabia were extremely conservative. Unlike them, MBS is a liberal who has almost completely opened up his country. Why were they hardly a topic in the western media? They were never taken care of. Because you submitted to the Americans.
MBS would only have to submit to American foreign policy. That's all. Then he is no longer a pariah and evil rogue dictator. Then he no longer needs "sports washing".
Or have you ever heard Messi being criticized for moving to a country that has the death penalty and people are being poisoned and roasted there? Where your government, with the complete support of the West, by the way, constantly raids, exploits, blackmails and bombs other countries into the Stone Age?
Saudis haven't offered enough money yet.
"Pay up, habibi."
Lovely quotes
Scottish Premier League?
Probably the usual ''Let's keep football and politics separate, like.''
A bit stupid saying that when this happens
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_football_clubs_in_international_competitions
I thought we were over this. There is a reason Israel is in UEFA and not in Asian confederation.
Good - It would potentially destroy european club football. UEFA chiefs will sell their souls though once enough money is offered to them individually.
I’m the last guy to defend state of Israel but they were admitted to UEFA in early 90s after numerous Arab countries in their region refused to play against them and it would be impossible to host games between those teams. Completely different situation.