June 19 – UEFA chief Aleksander Ceferin has warned Saudi Arabia that splashing out eye-watering sums of money on ageing superstar players is a mistake in terms of developing the game.
Ceferin (pictured) says the Saudi strategy of luring big-name players from Europe is in danger of mirroring the Chinese Super league which adopted the same policy a decade ago and where the game is now in a complete mess.
Cristiano Ronaldo’s switch to Al-Nassr in January has led to former Real Madrid teammate Karim Benzema, making a similar move to Al-Ittihad, with other high-profile names expected to follow suit.
But instead of paying hundreds of millions of euros to attract the likes of Ronaldo and Benzema for one last hurrah, the country should be putting that money into developing its own players, Ceferin argues.
“I think that it’s mainly a mistake for Saudi Arabian football,” Ceferin told a Dutch broadcaster. “Why is that a problem for them? Because they should invest in academies, they should bring coaches, and they should develop their own players.”
“The system of buying the players that (have) almost ended their career is not the system that develops football. It was a similar mistake in China when they all brought players who are at the end of their career.”
“Tell me one player who is top, top age and who starts his career and went to play in Saudi Arabia?”
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