Demitri_C Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 59 minutes ago, Keyblade said: If they sign Salah, that would be huge. If they sign salah then no clubs players are safe Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JPJCB Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 3 hours ago, The_Steve said: It’s not though, especially when the Saudi state is using its massive GDP to fund four teams for its political aims of normalising geopolitical ties and masking its abhorrent human rights abuses. This isn’t a bunch of rich blokes getting together to play fantasy football. It’s unprecedented in scale. This is the key point. Sport in general and football in particular convey soft power of a given nation. The PL does so for the Uk as do other leagues for other countries. We should be inherently against the rise of a league based in a country using it to launder its horrific human rights abuses Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zatman Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 7 minutes ago, Demitri_C said: If they sign salah then no clubs players are safe Not really Liverpool be delighted to sell. Wages are obscene 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Demitri_C Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 Just now, Zatman said: Not really Liverpool be delighted to sell. Wages are obscene Why? Salahs their best player! They would be crazy to sell him. Also rumours jotas off to saudi arabia too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 5 minutes ago, Demitri_C said: If they sign salah then no clubs players are safe Agree and disagree It shows that no one is safe from FFP and the business of selling players To be fair to them Liverpool are maybe the best team in the PL at selling players I think it's a year too early and too late in the summer for it but ultimately Liverpool are cashing in before the inevitable decline hits and they need to rebuild, you could the same about psg and neymar, there's a wow factor to the saudis signing them but on the quiet they're doing huge favours to the European teams 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zatman Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 2 minutes ago, Demitri_C said: Why? Salahs their best player! They would be crazy to sell him. Also rumours jotas off to saudi arabia too Cheap owners and Salah has a monster contract and is slowly declining. Club will bite the hand off Saudis Plus the fan base can claim to still have the Salah money when spending 240 million on a Brighton midfielder in 2028 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 3 hours ago, The_Steve said: It’s not though, especially when the Saudi state is using its massive GDP to fund four teams for its political aims of normalising geopolitical ties and masking its abhorrent human rights abuses. This isn’t a bunch of rich blokes getting together to play fantasy football. It’s unprecedented in scale. Is it though? It's obviously different but qatar just spent a supposed £200 billion on a world cup and that's just the face of it, not including the arms deals etc etc that it used to buy votes Still think tourism does more than football, put a price on dubais spending to make itself a tourist destination... That will be next for SA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MellbergsBeard Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 Do you think there will be a review of FFP due to this window? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted August 24, 2023 Share Posted August 24, 2023 6 hours ago, bobzy said: The Saudi Pro League has existed longer than the Premier League. Al-Hilal are the most successful team in Asian Champions League history (4 titles). Football is the most popular sport in Saudi Arabia. I'm curious by which of these is the nation "artificial"? The only thing they haven't done previously is thrown money at the domestic game. They're now doing that. There are so many things that can fairly be thrown at the government of SA, that it feels really jarring when people land on something completely invalid. And there is no idea more absurd than that Saudis are johnny-come-lately dilettantes who just discovered football five minutes ago. I've taught over a thousand young Saudis since 2016, many of them young men, and the vast majority have been utterly football-obsessed. We've had a knowledgeable Saudi member of VT for years! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted August 25, 2023 Moderator Share Posted August 25, 2023 14 hours ago, HanoiVillan said: AIUI the clubs haven't been created to form the league but were all previously in existence Fair cop. My only interest in it is as far as it affects transfers and the transfer market. It’s clearly been given a massive rocket boost by the injection of money, but that applies elsewhere too, perhaps. The wealth has led to loads of signings from top clubs in Europe and raised the profile of the league. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 Article in the FT today looking at the financial benefit to FIFA: Saudi Arabia’s football spending spree is a gift to Fifa '[...] Much ink has been spilled trying to explain the sudden push to turn the Saudi Pro League into something splashy. Some see a simple sportwashing project, an attempt to rebrand the autocratic kingdom as a hub for sport and leisure. Others say it is an honest — and expensive — attempt to get young Saudis off the sofa and into the gym. The advent of a new source of cash in football has been felt across the game. Cash-strapped clubs in Europe with bloated squads have welcomed a financial get-out; others have had to spend to replace talent unexpectedly whisked away. But it is Fifa, under its president Gianni Infantino, that could end up benefiting most. The institution has been pushing to generate new sources of revenue to reduce its dependence on the men’s World Cup, which accounts for more than 80 per cent of its income. In the four-year cycle ending in 2022, Fifa brought in $7.6bn from TV, sponsorship and ticketing. Uefa, thanks to the Champions League, can earn that amount in half that time, while the English Premier League can match it in a single season. Now part of Infantino’s plan is to launch what is in effect a new competition by overhauling the Club World Cup. Although it has existed in some form since 2000, the new version — launching in 2025 — promises to be a game-changer, featuring 32 teams from across the globe, who will compete in a month-long tournament modelled on a World Cup. Among the teams that have secured a spot in the 2025 edition is Riyadh-based Al-Hilal, winner of the 2021 Asian Champions League. The club is the biggest net spender in football this summer, offering a clue into Saudi hopes of creating a team packed with superstars that can compete on the world stage. [...] Fifa’s is already projecting income of more than $10bn from its next four-year cycle. That figure does not account for any revenue from the Club World Cup. With Saudi Arabia on board, that number is likely to climb.' more on link: https://www.ft.com/content/2eb04f95-0d29-4ac2-b167-4e7b782f36e8?emailId=9d4d308b-3508-4030-bd44-cecb9e53d35e&segmentId=22011ee7-896a-8c4c-22a0-7603348b7f22 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Steve Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 17 hours ago, villa4europe said: Is it though? It's obviously different but qatar just spent a supposed £200 billion on a world cup and that's just the face of it, not including the arms deals etc etc that it used to buy votes Still think tourism does more than football, put a price on dubais spending to make itself a tourist destination... That will be next for SA I agree about Qatar. However, that wasn’t my point. A country has taken ownership of four major teams to artificially inflate the competitiveness of its league with its enormous GDP, vastly skewing competitiveness and FFP constraints. This is not good for football at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mantis Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 20 hours ago, bobzy said: The Saudi Pro League has existed longer than the Premier League. Al-Hilal are the most successful team in Asian Champions League history (4 titles). Football is the most popular sport in Saudi Arabia. I'm curious by which of these is the nation "artificial"? The only thing they haven't done previously is thrown money at the domestic game. They're now doing that. Professional football in England didn't start with the Premier League? The Saudi Pro League only started in 1976 which is actually relatively late, and Al-Hilal's success is irrelevant. Put it another way: literally the only reason why players of such high calibre are going there now all of a sudden is money. Of course money is a factor too in European football for example but even the likes of Man City and PSG have an appeal beyond simply money. You can't say that about the Saudi clubs. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted August 25, 2023 Moderator Share Posted August 25, 2023 20 hours ago, bobzy said: See above post, but the Saudi Pro League has been around for ages. The only thing "artificial" about these teams now is the amount of money - in the same way that the Premier League became "artificial" when it had enough money to hoover up talent from across the globe. It's not the same, IMO. I take your point, but what has happened is completely different. In Saudi, the State has taken a very low level low quality league and then pumped an absolute ton of cash into several of the teams. There's no FFP, and the aim is to instantly, or near instantly make those 3 or 4 sides the same quality as top European clubs for the purposes of sportswashing and with the aim of them buying their way into the Champions league. The premier league is a re-named (old) First division, that when it was formed (and ever since) has been made up of the (sporting) best clubs in any season. While there's been a gradual increase in wealthy and then state ownership, owners can only own and fund one club (not 4), and the aim of those owners has been to make their club successful, rather than (until recently) any Sportswashing. That's happened with Man City and will with Newcastle, and then Man Utd in due course. There's still a (diminishing) semblance of being "real" about the Premier League - with history all the way back to the founding of the football league and some clubs being exactly the same ones from a century and a half (nearly) ago - Wolves, Burnley, Everton, Villa... I knew as soon as I wrote my earlier post that I'd get replies saying "it's not artificial, the Saudi clubs and league has been around a while (my mistake, hands up), but really, it's kind of in name only for the ones suddenly boosted by the State essentially taking control of them and making the league a tool of the state for sportswashing purposes. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gwi1890 Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 10 minutes ago, gwi1890 said: I don’t think the title is accurate as it has been tagged by “added context”. Very bizarre defending though even if a charity game. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 12 minutes ago, gwi1890 said: Man, he's such a prick Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Steve Posted August 25, 2023 Share Posted August 25, 2023 (edited) Saudi league ranked 36th globally by Opta Analyst, their biggest club is ranked just above Rangers globally. They’ve got a long way to go in making their league competitive https://theanalyst.com/eu/2023/07/who-are-the-best-football-team-in-the-world-opta-power-rankings/ Edited August 25, 2023 by The_Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Villatillidie95 Posted August 26, 2023 Share Posted August 26, 2023 AL NASSR 5 - AL FATEH 0 they just showed the highlights on sky sports news, what a joke! It was the ronaldo and mane show, ronaldo hattrick and mane brace Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sne Posted August 29, 2023 Share Posted August 29, 2023 Meanwhile Neymar, Messi and the rest gets millions from the Saudi tourism board for posting on Instagram about how lovely Saudi is. Quote Saudi retired teacher sentenced to death for criticising ruling family on social media Mohammed al-Ghamdi’s offences relate to his YouTube and Twitter accounts and ruling may be country’s first death sentence for online posts A Saudi court has sentenced a retired teacher to death for criticising the ruling family in messages to his nine social media followers. According to Human Rights Watch, 54-year-old Mohammed al-Ghamdi was sentenced to death on July 10 for various offences related to his activity on YouTube and X, formerly known as Twitter. The ruling may be the first death sentence for social media posts. The charges reportedly levied against the retired teacher include “describing the King or the Crown Prince in a way that undermines religion or justice”, “supporting a terrorist ideology”, and disseminating fake news “with the intention of executing a terrorist crime”. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/08/29/mohammed-al-ghamdi-death-sentence-saudi-arabia-twitter/ 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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