RIYADH—In a kingdom where the price of oil can swing elections on the other side of the planet, Monday night’s Al-Ittihad versus Al-Nassr match felt less like a domestic fixture and more like an off-Broadway morality play with a nine-figure budget. The Jeddah side, coached by the eternally aggrieved Nuno Espírito Santo, lined up against…
Jeddah Club vs. Al-Nassr: The Derby Where Oil Money Meets Existential Dread By “Abu Dhabi Al-Roberts,” International Correspondent-at-Large Jeddah –– If you squint through the smog of a Thursday night, the floodlights at Prince Abdullah Al-Faisal Stadium look less like beacons of sport and more like the interrogation lamps of late capitalism. Jeddah Club—population: mostly…
RIYADH — The desert air crackled with all the manufactured drama of a Netflix trailer last night as Al-Nassr and Al-Riyadh locked horns in what the league’s marketing department has optimistically labeled “The Capital Clásico.” That descriptor, like most things in modern football, is 30 percent history and 70 percent scented candle: a gentle lavender…
Al-Nassr vs. FC Istiklol Dushanbe: When Oil Money Meets a Mountain Republic’s Pride, and Nobody Really Wins By the time the final whistle blew in Riyadh, the scoreboard had already been forgotten by most of humanity. Al-Nassr 3, Istiklol 1—if you squinted at the scroll on Bloomberg’s ticker, you might have mistaken it for a…
Riyadh, Wednesday night: the floodlights are so bright over Mrsool Park they could probably be seen from low orbit, giving alien anthropologists yet another data point for their thesis titled “Earthlings Will Pay Anything to Watch a 38-Year-Old Run in Loops.” Al-Nassr versus FC Istiklol is, on paper, an AFC Champions League group-stage footnote—Portugal’s wandering…
Last night, in a flood-lit corner of Riyadh that smelled faintly of jet fuel and ambition, Al-Nassr—now essentially a luxury travel agency for Cristiano Ronaldo’s ego—met Al-Kholood, a club whose name translates to “The Immortals.” One side arrived in private jets, the other on a bus that still had sand from the Empty Quarter in…
Yerevan—The Armenian capital smells of apricots, diesel, and the faint, metallic whiff of existential dread that hovers over any nation whose neighbor keeps tanks on the lawn. On Thursday night, that bouquet was joined by grilled sardines and Cristiano Ronaldo’s cologne as Portugal rolled into town for a Euro qualifier. The final score—Portugal 3, Armenia…
