Barcelona president Joan Laporta shared some scathing thoughts on the Saudi Pro League during an interview with CNN. The controversial figurehead claimed there were “no sporting reasons” for players to move to the gulf state. Laporta hinted at the gigantic financial packages players are being offered to move to Saudi, adding: “You know, there are other reasons that are the priority.”
Is this a fair assessment? Certainly the sums on offer in the country are eye-watering. Even outside of the frankly unconscionable sums the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema are earning, there are life-changing salaries on offer. Ruben Neves’ £280,000 pay packet at Al-Hilal is more than he would have been offered at any Premier League club.
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The vast sums being offered to big-name stars have succeeded in attracting them to the Saudi Pro League. The division will be able to boast a wealth of box office talent when it kicks off next week. But for every Benzema there is an Igor Coronado. While they will be team-mates next season, Benzema is the latest Ballon d’Or winner while Coronado used to play for Banbury United after failing to break into the Milton Keynes Dons first-team squad.
This skill-gap is evident all over the league. While several clubs are now furnished with at least one star name, the majority of squads are made up of players several rungs below them. Jordan Henderson has risked his moral standing and England place to move from Liverpool to Al-Ettifaq. He will be playing alongside Paulo Victor, a Brazilian whose last club was Maritimo in Portugal, and Darko Velkovski who came to the club from HNK Rijeka in Croatia.
This is not meant to denigrate the players mentioned. Merely to highlight that you cannot buy a league wholesale. The core squads have been made up of domestic players from a country not noted for its football. These Saudi talents have been garnished by a sprinkling of players who largely did not make a dent even in relatively minor European leagues. At best, some of the non-Saudi players at these clubs before this summer had amassed impressive records in Brazilian football. Not bad, but a world away from the level Ronaldo, Benzema, Henderson and Neves are used to.
Which begs the question of how the Saudi Pro League games will actually play out? Will the illustrious new arrivals elevate those around them? Will they find it far too easy, suddenly feasting on defences of a standard far below those they were facing in the Champions League? Or perhaps their own standards will drop when confronted with a league in which they can coast?
Ronaldo’s 14 goals in 16 Pro League games is perhaps the clearest indication of how it might go. The Portuguese superstar looked back to his best against a severely-reduced level of opposition. Not everyone is Ronaldo, of course. But with those numbers as our only guide, you’d think the likes of Benzema, Firmino and Sadio Mane could have fun padding their already-impressive stats.
Complacency could be an issue. The example of Carlos Tevez comes to mind. The former Manchester City and West Ham United forward openly admitted he treated his brief stint at Shanghai Shenhua in the Chinese Super League as a holiday. The CSL was the last league to attempt the SPL’s all-at-once recruitment strategy. They eventually threw in the towel and chose to focus on domestic players when they found a mercenary attitude in many of their imports. The contrast of massive sums of money and a league that lacks spotlight and true competitiveness could lead to many players taking the Tevez route.
It will be fascinating to watch this experiment in real time. Even the Chinese Super League didn’t sign this many players of such a high-profile in a single summer. Nor did they boast arguably the most famous footballer on the planet. But like in China, the standard of the non-superstars could prove wearying for the expensive new recruits. Football is a sport after all, and while money drives it now more than ever there is more to the game than the almighty dollar. Don’t be surprised to see a few of Saudi’s glitzy new acquisitions play a part in the 2024-25 Champions League campaign.
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