With the utmost respect to Haydeer Abdulkareem, the Iraq Under-23 international who was Al-Nassr’s only signing of the Saudi Pro League January transfer window, he was never going to move the needle for Cristiano Ronaldo. Ronaldo has reportedly gone on strike over that lack of activity. Can you imagine his facial expression? Yes, because it’s the only way to imagine his face.
I know what you’re thinking: fair enough for playing the long game. Ronaldo has lived in Saudi Arabia for three years, so he’s now fully educated himself on the human rights issues surrounding the treatment of migrant workers and the LGBTQ+ community. And he’s taken a stand. All power to the fight!
According to A Bola in Portugal, Ronaldo refused to play in Al-Nassr’s league game against Al-Riyadh on Monday in protest at the lack of transfer activity of his club. Part of his concern: Al Hilal eyeing up Karim Benzema from Al-Ittihad, a move that did eventually go through on Deadline Day. Benzema also went on strike after a deterioration in contract talks, to force a move.
How better to epitomise football’s slow dance with late-stage capitalism than such a farce: ageing elite-level footballers making themselves unavailable to get their own way and shape the business done by the four major clubs in the Saudi Pro League, all of whom have the same majority owner: Saudi’s own Public Investment Fund. At least you save money on the biscuits during transfer negotiations.
Ronaldo, we should remember, signed a new contract with Al Nassr/Saudi Arabia/Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud – delete as you feel appropriate – last July that runs until 2027 and is worth a reported £488,000 a day – a day – before all the myriad extras. As glorious sick days go, earning a cool half a million while you watch repeats of Hoarders and Minder is up there.
In Ronaldo’s defence, he may well have expected a little preferential treatment given that he has accepted being a key actor in Saudi Arabia’s soft power regime. At his contract unveiling Ronaldo did literally say the words: “I belong to Saudi Arabia”. Truly the romcom of our age.
And he’s paid his dues. In November, Ronaldo travelled to the White House for a meeting with Donald Trump and the Saudi crown prince. Elon Musk was there. There’s even a photograph of Ronaldo guffawing at something Trump said. That must be worth a new £20m signing in January at least.
Ordinarily, you might expect that Al Nassr’s response to Ronaldo’s world-class dummy-throwing would be to point at the numbers in that new contract and mutter “Are you taking the piss, pal? Our average home attendance is below 19,000”.
But nothing is normal here. Saudi Arabia’s original plan, as the great sportswashing disruption project of modern football through their own domestic league hoovering up the best talent, hasn’t really worked.
It has created a weird dichotomy: a league that services a series of vastly overpaid, ageing players who simultaneously seem to hold more power than their clubs and yet can only subservient to the ultimate kingmakers, the Saudi state itself.
For Ronaldo, merely the latest slide into prolific parody. Whatever you make of him, and of this gold-plated football mirage in the desert, he was at least always playing and scoring goals. Fewer goals than Ivan Toney this season, granted, but goals all the same.
That became the defence of this move to those who cherish him: he just wanted to keep on keeping on. Look past the individualism, the ego and the sulks and you still had a freak of talent and professionalism.
It reminds of Mike Clegg’s anecdote from when he was development coach at Manchester United and was asked how Ronaldo does it: “Thousands and thousands of hours of graft. He would be in the gym with me doing core work, then he would do activation, then his actual football training.
“After training, back into the gym and do some power work for his legs. Then home to the right food, swim, more work, sleep and then repeat. He did that for five or six years.”
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Now the ultimate professional is refusing to play; a tantrum about a lack of new players that he feels Al Nassr need or risk Ronaldo missing out on a first domestic trophy in Saudi once again. He is missing the point. This isn’t about transfers because it isn’t about football because it isn’t about sport. It is merely reinforcing sport’s place within a nexus of geopolitical willy-waving.
Presumably it will all be smoothed over soon – perhaps they could give Ronaldo a pay rise? Until then, he is the £492m figurehead sat on his own naughty step, the geopolitical influencer who took the money, wore the crown and then realised that he still wasn’t the boss.
This hot mess would be quite entertaining if it wasn’t so damned bleak. Bask in this glorious football-themed dystopia.
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