Friday/Saturday, July 17, 2026

By Ammar Al-Ammar:

* Our national team's painful reality... It seems that our national team's painful reality is not only its exit from the group stage of the World Cup or presenting technically distorted, physically poor, and tactically difficult performances. Our team's problems will not be due to a coach, team manager, or administrator, nor will the football association with its resigning president and remaining members be the cause. Those following the state of our sports in recent years understand why our team has reached this state: they qualify through the eye of a needle to the World Cup, only to leave empty-handed, becoming the weakest team technically. Worse still, comparing what the Green (Saudi national team) players have delivered, we find their contracts are worth tens of millions and most sit on the bench at their clubs. Why? Because we want to raise the level of the Saudi league technically, media-wise, marketing-wise, and viewership-wise with 8 foreign players on the field (and indeed all this has been achieved). Our league's viewership is in the billions, players are superstars, the league is strong and ranked among the top 10 leagues worldwide, channels compete to broadcast matches. But after all this, we end up with a weak national team. Unfortunately, it faces two important commitments on our home soil and in front of our fans: the 2026 Gulf Cup and the 2027 Asian Cup. Preparations must be different for these two tournaments to win or compete for them, paving the way for a team to take part in the 2030 World Cup qualifiers and the most important event, the 2034 World Cup hosted by the Kingdom. This starts with a new team prepared from now with young players given opportunities even at their clubs, reducing the number of foreigners, and contracting an exceptional coaching staff to lead the Green for years, appointing a new administrative team away from random selection.

* Our referees and the World Cup: We hoped to see a Saudi referee officiate even one half in the World Cup, but unfortunately we left empty-handed in terms of refereeing, just like our team. To our regret, our referees stopped at being a fourth official and an assistant fourth official. This confirms that the level of Saudi referees does not match strong competitions like the World Cup, where the elite referees of the world were chosen to officiate its matches. This confirms that the selection of foreign referees to manage our domestic competitions is correct by all measures. 75% of the referees chosen for the World Cup had previously officiated domestic competitions in Saudi Arabia, i.e., 38 out of 51 referees. Despite this, there are those who reject the presence of foreign referees and fiercely attack them, preferring the local referee who has proven his failure by all measures, but who succeeds with them perfectly.

* Failed attempts at belittlement and blatant comparison: With every tournament our team plays, there are dissonant voices aiming to belittle stars who served the national team in order to polish other players who also served the team but have weak numbers. The number suffices to respond to those fond of talk, because opinions are based on emotional feelings of love or hate. Your love for a player does not make him the best according to your opinion, nor does your hate for a player diminish him or strip him of his superiority in numbers. The legend of Saudi football, Sami Al-Jaber, is the player whose achievements have been most belittled, with attempts to distort his image and fight him by all means. But he remained steadfast, turning others' attacks into a path to the top because they, with stupidity and foolishness, contributed to charting the roadmap for the global stardom of the legend Sami Al-Jaber and his presence in all forums. The attempt to belittle (verbally) the legend of Saudi football Sami Al-Jaber is frequently repeated even though he has been retired for nearly 20 years, but the numbers are sufficient to respond to them, through a comparison between Sami Al-Jaber and the top five local forwards in the history of Al-Nassr Club (Al-Abdali, Majed Abdullah, Saad Al-Harthi, Ryan Bello, and Muhammad Al-Sahlawi). Sami achieved 7 achievements with the national team, while the five Al-Nassr stars achieved 6 achievements. Sami Al-Jaber won 24 titles with Al-Hilal, while the five Al-Nassr stars won 22 titles. In 4 World Cup qualifiers, Sami Al-Jaber participated, and the team qualified 4 times. The five Al-Nassr stars participated in 8 qualifiers, and the team qualified 3 times. In the most important and strongest event, the World Cup, Sami participated 4 times and scored 3 goals, while the five Al-Nassr stars participated only 3 times and scored no goals. How many have you scored is important, but how many you have achieved and accomplished is the most important, and this is what makes Sami always superior.

* Ronaldo and the sad ending The sixth World Cup carried a sad ending for Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo after he failed to win the world title, following a fruitless career without achievement at the end of his sporting life with the World Cup, during which he did not win the title, the best player award, or the top scorer. Ronaldo's career with the Portuguese national team spanned more than 22 years, achieving only a single title, the 2016 European Championship, besides two weak Nations League titles!? Ronaldo came to the Saudi League and enriched our competitions with much attention and viewership, but he only succeeded in winning a single local title after 4 seasons, during which he failed to achieve any local title after participating in 11 local tournaments.

Sports closure: * Why do some praise the local referee and reject the foreign referee? * Why do some view Sami Al-Jaber's numbers with the national team and Al-Hilal as failure, yet see Ronaldo's numbers with his country's national team and Al-Nassr as unparalleled success? When standards are reversed, you hear such talk...

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