Liverpool have had to deal with interest from Saudi Arabia for two players this week, while Steven Gerrard and Roberto Firmino have already made the move.
Saudi Arabia will stay in football.
It seems unlikely to play out like China’s affair with the megastars a few years ago; There is a long-established football fanbase in the Middle East and a long-term vision coupled with enough financial clout to suggest this could be successfully implemented.
But there are also questions for those who might be ready to make some money. This week both Jordan Henderson and Fabinho have been tempted, with the latter looking to complete a $52m (£40m/€47m) transfer deal. For Henderson in particular, it seemed unimaginable given his stance on various issues and his leadership on things like the Rainbow Laces campaign.
Various Liverpool legends have found their destiny tied to Saudi Arabia in recent weeks. Steven Gerrard and then Roberto Firmino moved into the country two days in a row and very few seemed to see a problem there. The fact that Henderson was able to tip over was a surprise that shows no one is immune.
Empire of the Kop conducted a Twitter poll, and 79.6% of nearly 26,000 respondents said they did not feel “disappointed” with Gerrard and Firmino (this happened before interest in Henderson and Fabinho does not become public). The general tone of the responses was that they had all earned the right to big paydays.
It is unclear how good service rendered to Liverpool makes it morally acceptable to go and get money from a country where homosexuality is still illegal and where what Amnesty International calls “grossly unfair trials” can lead to the death penalty.
To be brutally honest, that reaction is emotional rather than logical, understandable against the blurring of the names of some of the club’s real figureheads.
But if attachment to individual players is enough to sweep four-fifths of respondents under the carpet of concerns about Saudi Arabia, then it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that attachment to the club itself would overshadow all other concerns in the case of a hypothetical state detect. , as we have seen elsewhere.
There is some nuance to the situation and it should be recognized. Part of the dissatisfaction with the sudden rise of the Saudi League is undoubtedly protectionist in nature. The Premier League was once the big troublemaker with its tons of money and they don’t like to see a new league in that role.
It is also true that companies and even governments around the world routinely do business with Saudi Arabia without collective criticism. Requiring a moral attitude from players means forcing them to hold themselves to higher standards than the vast majority of companies and even countries.
