Saudi football is enjoying its best period with the support and attention of a wise leadership that paved the way for it to lead Asian football and opened the doors to global horizons.
This qualitative leap achieved by Saudi football in 2022 is not the result of chance or luck, but is supported by the special support of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, King Suleiman bin Abdulaziz, may God preserve him, and His Highness the Crown Prince, His Royal Highness Prince Muhammad bin Salman, May God protect him.
The start was made on the initiative of His Highness the Crown Prince to take care of the debts of foreign clubs, which placed a huge financial burden on them and forced them to devote themselves to other technical matters.
As the Ministry of Sports introduced several initiatives to revive the financial resources of clubs and opened up the possibility for them to sign contracts with the world’s elite players, it has left the Prince Mohammed bin Salman Cup Professional League to be the first at the Asian level. , technically or as a marketing value.
Saudi football quickly reaped the rewards of this support and interest, with the first national team qualifying for the World Cup for the sixth time in its history, and Al Akhdar booked a ticket to the World Cup in Qatar even before the end of the final qualification round, an unprecedented achievement. , as well as his Asian group leading throughout the qualification, despite the presence of teams the size of Japan and Australia.
Then yesterday came the achievement of the Olympic team, which confirmed that Saudi football is on the right track and gives confidence in the future, especially since Al-Ahdar’s Olympic victory in the AFC U-23 Cup is not only a coronation, but and our team beat all the numbers and achieved unprecedented achievements.
The Saudi Greens became the first team to win a continental or even a world championship with a clean sheet, as they did not concede a single goal in 6 matches, three of them in the group stage and the same number in the playoffs.
Our Olympic team also finished the competition as the strongest attacker with 13 goals, while Green Hawk stars Nawaf Al-Aqidi won the tournament’s best goalkeeper, Ayman Yahya won the tournament’s best player, and Al-Akhdar won the fair play title.
Olympic Green also became the most Asian team to reach the tournament final three times in 2013, 2020 and 2022.
What is important for the Olympic green is that it includes a group of promising stars of the future of Saudi football who have established themselves as key players at their team level through a number of foreign professionals, including Hassan Timbukti and Turki Al-Ammar (Al-Shabaab ), Saud Abdul Hamid and Mutaib Al-Harbi (Al-Hilal) Hamid Al-Ghamdi (Al-Ettifak) Hussein Al-Essa (Al-Batin), Firas Al-Braykan (Al-Fateh) ), Ayman Yahya (on loan from Al-Nasr at Al-Ahly), goalkeeper Nawaf Al-Aqidi (on loan from Al-Nasr at Al-Thai).
The national coach, Saad Al Shehri, has been able to lead this group of players with great ability by taking advantage of his good experience in the Asian Championships he has competed in in recent years and presenting himself as a national coach capable of reserving a spot. for himself among the international coaches working in our league and he still has the opportunity in front of him to develop and rise to the best places.
