Topic: Saudi Professional League 2023/2024 - page 28. (Read 110241 times)

And the ten foreign players have positions from goalkeeper, defenders, midfielders to attacking players. They are good and helpful for Al-Hilal to have good quality and balance between defense and attacking systems. It makes different than other big clubs like Al-Nassr, the biggest competitor of Al-Hilal in Saudi Arabia recent months. Al-Nassr has good attacking power but their defense system is very bad and it affects ability of Al-Nassr to earn points in the league matches.

It's biggest weakness of Al-Nassr last season but in early matches of this season, their performances show that they have yet resolves these weaknesses well. So it's possible for Al-Hilal to defend their title in Saudi Professional League.

Al Ittihad is the only team that has spent lot of money to be able to develop the team to have performance equal to other top team, but indeed all their efforts have not been able to produce results and the only reason in my opinion is the coach mistake who could not utilize all the great players.
But now Al Ittihad has new coach Laurent Blanc who is also one of the coaches with undoubted experience, with Laurent Blanc and several players owned by Al Ittihad including Steven Bergwij, many people are quite sure that in the future Al Ittihad can play better.
On the other hand, Steven Bergwij is also player who actually has quite good potential if he can really be developed more dominantly, I sure that with what Al Ittihad has now will be able to bring them to compete for the SPL competition or other competitions more competitively.

Many people want the same thing, namely Al Nassr can stop Al Hilal's dominance, but the problem is that they also still have their own problems, so that's what makes it difficult for them to compete tightly. The reason why many people want to see AL Nassr stop Al Hilal's dominance is because they also want to see Cristiano Ronaldo win the title in the Saudi Pro League, it will complete his achievements at club level. He will not be playing football for long, he will decide to retire, maybe next season or at the latest 2 more seasons. Well, before seeing him announce his retirement, his fans want to see his latest achievements in the team he plays for, or even if possible, fans will wait for his appearance at the 2026 World Cup.

You may not read the rule because it is not really necessary for fans.    
Well, SPL committee and SAFF (Saudi Arabian Football Federation) has announced the new rule for SPL in December, 2023. Actually each team in SPL could register only maximum 8 foreign players in the past but they can register up to 10 foreign players (non Saudi players). It is surely good news for all SPL teams, they have 2 extra quota for non Saudi players. Anyway, another change is about the maximum players to register by each team in SPL. Now, they only can register maximum 25 players only. I am a bit confusing with this change because each team can register up to 30 players previously. I think this makes the teams in the SPL to have fewer players for various competitions in the whole season. How if there are many injured players? It is possible to make a difficulty for the coaches to rotate the players.

References:
1. https://www.saudigazette.com.sa/article/639165/Sports/Saudi-Pro-League-increases-foreign-player-quota-to-10-from-2024-2025-Season
2. https://www.goal.com/en/lists/saudi-pro-league-foreign-player-regulations-summer-transfer/blt72d8ecb78f1766c3#csac38e7112a6aff3c
3. https://www.givemesport.com/explaining-the-saudi-pro-league-foreign-players-rule/

Al Hilal has 10 foreign players (non Saudi players) for the season 2024-2025.
You can check the detailed information on https://www.transfermarkt.com/al-hilal-sfc/legionaere/verein/1114

This season they are playing very well, the attack is so good that even Benzema scored a goal. I don't understand why they gave up on signing the Porto player, Galeno, all the news sites were already reporting the deal as concrete.


source: https://transfer-site.co.uk/other/al-ittihad-push-for-galeno-with-e45m-bid-after-arsenal-reject-trossard-offer/

They made the Porto player stop training to deal with matters related to this transfer and when they were about to close the deal, they backed out and this created a lot of noise in the Portuguese press, with commentators even saying that Porto intended to complain to FIFA. Then they appeared announcing Steven Bergwij. It's funny that this also generated another controversy:


source: https://x.com/FabrizioRomano/status/1830930635994607953

I think that next time the management of Al Ittihad needs to be more organized

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In this transfer window, the Arabs were once again the center of attention:


source: https://www.fcbarcelonanoticias.com/en/transfers/saudi-arabia-breaks-the-market-again-the-huge-sum-spent-by-the-saudis-during-the-summer_307030_102.html

but there was a big reduction in money spent, this means that in the next transfer windows, they will sign fewer players. perhaps when Ronaldo retires these signings will reduce drastically and the Saudi league will return to being little known

Well, this is a fairly new rule that seems to be implemented starting this season. But from several sources that I read, it turns out that previously the number of non-Saudi players who could be registered was only 8 players. But since this season it seems like the rules have been changed from initially only 8 players were allowed to be registered then now to 10 players. For this reason, several clubs are becoming increasingly aggressive in adding new European players in the transfer market. Except for a few clubs that have already reached the limit. (Sourch)
And yes Al-hilal has reached that limit. But I'm happy to hear that Neymar will eventually return to playing. Last season I didn't pay much attention to the SPL. Except for a few Al-Nassr matches. But this season I have become more interested in this league. And it would be great if Neymar also played this season.

I wasn't aware that Saudi Pro League has a rule to not register more than 10 players in every club per season. It appears that Al-Hilal has more than ten and with the return of Neymar, Renan Lodi place with the registered players might be taken. Al-Hilal registered Neymar for the 2024-2025 season. Hopefully he will not be injured after a couple of matches again..

Al-shabab managed to make a good purchase at a fairly normal cost. And not so high as other clubs from the SPL always do. This is understandable because Daniel Podence was actually not really needed by Wolverhampton last season. Daniel Podence last season was loaned to Olympiacos. And Olympiacos was actually the club that sold him to Wolverhampton. But at Wolverhampton he was unable to compete with other players so he ended up being loaned out. and now his decision to go to the SPL, namely to the Al-shabab club, is the right decision. Because I think even though the level in Europe is mediocre. but in the SPL I'm sure this player will be really needed. And Al-Shabab can certainly make good use of it.

I usually don't stick to the plan for a club to loan a player that's at his peak, open phase for Trossard to shine this season. He bagged quite good numbers of goals for his former club, I don't seem to forget in a hurry the season he single-handedly displayed one of the stunning moves and world class performance against Liverpool, probably in 2022 where Brighton draw points with Liverpool, 3-3 on the scoresheet where Robert Firmino scored a brace for Liverpool and Leandro Trossard bagged an hattrick.

In Arsenal, he's lacking playtime and this have turn to be hurdle for him. Leandro Trossard is still key project for Mikel Arteta. We should respect the fact that he's one of the top talents in Mikel Arteta squad. The Belgian focused more on scoring goals and this have been nothing but a concerning high tabled statistics for the player. Trossard will make his decision that will perfectly suit him in.

Let's be realistic and say that Trossard is not someone that could benefit greatly to Arsenal, just because they do not agree to loan him here, doesn't mean that they think he is a vital part of the process they have there. He is good enough of a bench player that he could replace some players when needed be and that is why he is staying there, and will keep on staying there until they find a better rotation player.

Why would they agree on sending their best rotation player on loan when they have no incentive to do that? They could have potentially sold him for a lot of money if there was an offer like that, but there isn't an offer like that so they are not going to end up loaning him just to avoid paying some salary.

One of the biggest clubs in the Saudi League is Al Hilal and they have been performing quite consistently, but the team is the most talked about for signing Neymar from PSG for a significant amount of money. At that time we all said that adding Neymar to their team made their team stronger and that their team would become an unstoppable team. However, this team has become an unstoppable team but without Neymar. Neymar has been injured for a long time and after joining the Saudi club Al Hilal, the Brazilian star only got a chance to play a few matches for this club but then he was injured for a long time and has not been able to return to the field until now. There is no confirmation yet on whether Al Hilal will renew Neymar's contract. If they extend the contract with Neymar for one more season and if Neymar is available to play, then the strength of this team will definitely increase.

Well it's getting more interesting, Al- Ittihad brings in more new players from European leagues this means they are not only a complement in the standings but also as competitors in the title race. Based on data on transfermarkt Al- Ittihad has brought in 6 new players from Europa with a total budget of around 124 million and Steven Bergwijn is the 2nd most expensive player brought in this season, previously there was Moussa Diaby who was brought in from Aston Villa for 60 million or 5 million above the market price.

For the defense line, Al-Ittihad has prepared Danilo Pereira and Mario Mitaj Also Predrag Rajkovic as a new goalkeeper to secure the goal, I think Al-Ittihad is close to reach complete squad just need 2-3 more players in the defensive area because we know their competitors also have aggressive players in the attack line so it takes more players to overcome it. The transfer window is still open in the Saudi Pro League which means there is still a chance to bring them in, let's wait for the next week.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/article/2024/sep/02/arsenal-turn-down-al-ittihad-approach-for-belgium-forward-leandro-trossard

Letting Trossard move to Saudi Arabia will be a good business for Arsenal. The Belgian international is twenty-nine years old and his performance might decline in a few years. Accepting the €35m offer from Al-Ittihad will be highly profitable.  But Arsenal has declined to let him go even with the presence of good players such as Raheem Sterling and Gabriel Martinelli who can play his position.

Playing in the English Premier League is too hectic because there are many competitions to play. Arsenal is also playing in the UCL, making their schedule tight. This is why most top coaches will always want to have enough reserve players in case of injuries, suspensions or fatigue. It is not just about making a profit but sustaining the quality of the team.      

Arsenal recruited Trossard from Brighton for 20 million euros and now they have an offer from Al Ittihad for 35 million euros and automatically if they accept the offer then Arsenal will make a big profit at the moment, but Arsenal today is not the Arsenal of the past who often sell their star players when it comes to offers from other clubs, Trossard indeed continues to be a supersub at Arsenal last season but after his performance against Aston Villa in the second week this season it looks like Trossard will Getting a place in the starting line-up Arsenal, especially now  Martinelli who is also experiencing a decline in performance, so I think Arsenal is not selling Trossard in the near future because anyway to compete in the Champions League and the Premier League of course Arteta needs a qualified squad, besides that reportedly Arsenal and Arteta have ambitions to break the negative trend for the last 22 years are now starting to build a squad with long-term projects and  Selling Trossard will only make their squad weak and unbalanced later.

In Arsenal's last match, Arteta even made Trossard into the starting XI. Like the match against Brighton.

Looks like I missed this one too. I didn't check the list of players that Al-ittihad had managed to get. And after reading your reply and I see that indeed Danilo Pereira has come to Al-ittihad. With the arrival of Danilo Pereira to Al-ittihad, perhaps the defensive midfielder position in the Al-ittihad squad will become more perfect. The experience of this player is beyond doubt. he had a long career at Porto and PSG. And I think this player will immediately adapt well to Al-ittihad and help Al-ittihad become even better.

he is our player, although he often starts from the bench. even so, his role with The Gunners is very contributory. Trossard wants to get a core role in the Arsenal squad, but Arteta often positions him as a supersub. fortunately, he often becomes the determinant of Arsenal's victory even though he is often played in the second half. it is clear that Arsenal will definitely reject him, especially now that Nektiah has left. there are not many options to become Arsenal's center forward line, so it is natural for Arsenal to reject him. besides, I did not read the report that Trossard had reached an agreement with Al Ittihad. if you look at Al Ittihad's plan, it seems that Trossard will be made a winger if Arsenal and the player agree. so, maybe Al Ittihad will look for other options to find the ideal one, because they seem to be prioritizing one more winger for their squad. by the way I seem to have missed something, it turns out that Danilo Pereira has joined Al Ittihad. at least, with his maturity and stability he can be relied on by Laurent Blanc in the defense of his squad.

Al Ittihad hired some superstar players but they will couldn't have a good performance in the Saudi Arabia and they still failed to get a good place in the table at the end of the last season but now they are trying harder and they don't want to lose the chance to hire some superstar and end expensive players to have better results in this season.
That's why they hired Steven Bergwij the player of Ajax. He left Tottenham to join Ajax back in 2022 and now Steven Bergwij joined Al Ittihad for 21 million euros.

It is very clear that Arsenal will definitely not be willing to let go of one of their mainstay players. And we know Trossard is very important at Arsenal. He has always been one of Arteta's mainstay players in the Arsenal squad. So releasing this player will only put Arsenal at risk of decreasing sharpness in the attack line.  But Al-ittihad will not stop until they actually get players who are willing to join their club. Because Al-ittihad realizes that they are still far below the current A-hilal level. And if Al-ittihad wants to regain its glory, this club must add strength again. I'm sure Al-ittihad will get it. but I'm not sure if it's Galeno or not.

Anyone still remember Chris Smalling? The former Manchester United and Roma player has completed a deal with Al-Fayha for a 2-year contract. Chris Smalling will open a new path in his career and it doesn't feel too bad as a newcomer in the Saudi league this season.

Although he only joined a mediocre team from the Saudi league, it doesn't change the fact that he was a good player in the past. He is already 34 years old and one step away we will probably see him retire and maybe Al-Fayha will be his last club. He left Roma this season after the Italian club did not extend his contract.

Yes, Al Hilal is indeed able to maintain consistent performance quite well. This will indeed have a very good impact on Al Hilal, but I personally feel a little bored if, for example, the Saudi Arabian League competition is only limited to that. Because if you look deeper, this season the Saudi Arabian League clubs have not experienced much change in performance. A big example is Al Nasr, this season Al Nasr has not experienced any significant changes either in terms of performance or quality of players. The reason is that Al Nasr sometimes still has difficulties when facing teams that are not that great. For example, when Al Nasr played against Al Raed, at that time Al Nasr was very difficult and only achieved a draw in that match. So it is evident that even a team as big as Al Nasr has not experienced a significant increase in performance. That's why I said the teams in the Saudi Arabian League don't seem to have changed this season.

Maybe Al Qadisiyah is currently the only hope of being able to keep up with Al Hilal. Because until now Al Qadisiyah has really shown quite good performance in every match. This is of course due to the quality of the players they brought in in this transfer market. For example, Nacho Fernandes and Aubameyang. Therefore, I personally can't wait to watch the match between Al Hilal VS Al Qadisiyah. Because I hope that with the great squad that Al Qadisiyah currently has, they can beat Al Hilal. So the Saudi Arabian League has several very interesting competitions to watch.