Big Moves And A Football Revolution: The Saudi Story
There is no doubt the Saudi Arabia Pro league had grown in tremendous fashion since the first big move to the competition. Late in 2022 one of the most iconic figures in world football, Cristiano Ronaldo made the switch to the Saudi Pro League. After openly criticizing his then employers, Manchester United, Ronaldo was dumped, giving him the leeway to make a free-transfer move to the league. He joined Al Nassr and things haven’t been the same again.
The following summer, a massive influx of players from top leagues followed and now the Saudi league is home to many who just a season back were key players in their clubs’ ambitions in Europe. The Saudi Arabia national team’s win over Argentina at the 2022 FIFA World Cup also contributed to the big profile the league would get thereafter and the authorities have milked this as much as possible. The English Premier League particularly lost a lot of talent to the moneyed league. This, of course, sliced a big chunk of the betting market. A lot of marketing has of course followed, as bookies seek to stay afloat and key among them has been great welcome offers going up to £30 among a variety of incentives; so are you a football fan? Find the best football betting sites in the UK, profiled on Cheekypunter.
Summer spending
In the summer transfer, a figure close to £790m was spent on top players and coaches moving to the league. As a result, the Saudi Pro League now ranks not only among the best paying in the world, in terms of social media following, it has also picked up well over the last year and can dare stand up to some of the best. Data from Livescore for the past one year indicates that online interest in the league has gone up by over 4000%. A year after Ronaldo joined Al Nassr, for example, the club’s social media impressions rose from a paltry 576 to 942,000 in a 12-month period. There were transfers also for the likes of Neymar, who are credited for the rise in social media impressions for Al Hilal, which shot up, to 669,328 from below 1000 under a year back. With these numbers, the Saudi Pro League has even surpassed the impressions posted by the French Ligue 1, one of the major leagues in the world.
Religion card
Part of the Saudi story has been taking advantage of the religion card, to attract top stars, including Ngolo Kante, Karim Benzema, Sadio Mane, Kalidou Koulibaly and more, all players with Champions League impetus. Benzema, a top performer at Real Madrid admitted to religion being one of the key lures for his move, even as he had achieved all at club level in Europe. The ripple effect of this growth has also seen the country investing in women football and now there is a women’s national team, formed to take part in international competitions. While it is all starting from scratch, the progress in women’s football is rapid, and there is already talk of 2027 Women’s World Cup ambitions, all fuelled by the gains from the Saudi Pro League.
