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Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund-owned Al-Ahli's crowning as the AFC Champions League champion for the first time in its history was a significant event that sparked a lot of reactions on Saudi social media.
Al-Ahli's victory came after defeating Japan's Kawasaki Frontale 2-0 at Al-Inma Stadium in Jeddah. With this title, Al-Ahli became the third Saudi team to win the AFC Champions League, following Al-Hilal (who won four titles in 1992, 2000, 2019, and 2021) and Al-Ittihad (who won two titles in 2004 and 2005).
It's worth noting that Al-Ahly is one of the Saudi teams targeted by the Saudi Sports Project. Since June 2023, the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF) has held a 75 percent stake in Al-Ahly, Al-Hilal, Al-Nasr, and Al-Ittihad clubs.
Al-Ahly Club's first continental title marks a milestone for the Saudi sports project, highlighting its progress as it nears the two-year mark since its launch.
This article highlights the success from a sporting, marketing, and financial perspective, in addition to the victory of the Saudi national team. Therefore, this article primarily attempts to re-evaluate the Saudi sports project.
Although the project encompasses a range of aspects, such as tennis, boxing, and others, we will focus primarily on football in this article.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's announcement of the investment and privatization project for sports clubs represented a qualitative new step aimed at improving sports in the Kingdom and achieving the goals of "Saudi Vision 2030" in the sports sector, according to the project announcement statement launched by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman on June 5, 2023.
The announced project includes two main tracks. The first is to approve major companies and development entities investing in sports clubs in exchange for transferring ownership to them.
According to this track, Saudi clubs—Al-Hilal, Al-Ittihad, Al-Nasr, and Al-Ahly—will be transformed into companies, with 75% of their ownership going to the Saudi PIF, while the remaining 25% will be held by non-profit organizations represented by each club's general assembly.
Four other clubs will be transformed into companies, and their ownership transferred to development entities: Al-Qadisiyah Club, whose ownership will be transferred to Saudi Aramco; Al-Diriyah Club to the Diriyah Gate Development Authority; Al-Ula Club to the Royal Commission for Al-Ula Governorate; and Al-Suqoor Club to NEOM.
An investment fund will also be established for each of the eight club companies whose ownership has been transferred.
The Saudi Sports Clubs Investment and Privatization Project sought to achieve three strategic objectives:
Creating qualitative opportunities and an attractive environment for investment in the sports sector: Saudi Arabia is working to strengthen its investment plan targeting the sports sector.
Raising the level of professionalism and administrative and financial governance in Saudi clubs: The value of government support for Saudi Professional League clubs at the end of fiscal year 2022 amounted to approximately 1.4 billion Saudi riyals, excluding Al-Ahly Club, which has not announced its financial results.
The project aims to privatize clubs in general, which will help in creating a distinguished sports generation at the regional and global levels, in addition to developing the game of football and its competitions in particular, to bring the Saudi League to the list of the best (10) leagues in the world and increase the revenues of the Saudi Professional League from 450 million riyals to more than 1.8 billion riyals annually, in addition to raising the market value of the Saudi Professional League from 3 billion to more than 8 billion riyals.
Based on the aforementioned objectives, the author believes that the project's primary goal is to raise the level of sports entertainment and create a unique experience, rather than increasing the number of Saudi team championships.
The market value of the sports sector in Saudi Arabia increased to 32 billion riyals ($8 billion) this year, up from 5 billion riyals in 2018, with a target of 80 billion riyals ($21 billion) by 2030, according to the Saudi Ministry of Investment.
The number of tourists attending sporting events in Saudi Arabia reached 14 million last year. The size of the sports market has witnessed remarkable growth in recent years, growing from $477.8 billion in 2024 to $507.69 billion in 2025.
Saudi Arabia also won the rights to host the 2034 FIFA World Cup, a huge achievement that underscores the kingdom's expanding sports infrastructure and global ambitions.
There is no doubt that the infrastructure development project for Saudi sports teams helped win the World Cup hosting rights.
Among the promotional achievements was the Saudi Professional League's first-place ranking for 2024 by the Asian Football Confederation.
Additionally, the league's television broadcast exceeded 200 million views, with broadcasts reaching 160 countries around the world, with an average of three matches per week.
Fourteen players from the league participated in the European Championship, and 10 players were recruited from among the world's top 100 players.
The Saudi sports project has achieved significant results. In addition to its ability to attract world-class players such as Benzema, Cristiano Ronaldo, Firmino, and Neymar, the league has also been able to attract world-class players previously competing with major teams, such as Ivan Toney, Ruben Neves, and Houssem Aouar.
This proves that the Saudi League is not just a league for older players.
In addition, Al-Ahly's achievement in winning the AFC Champions League for the elite proves that Saudi teams are stronger than ever.
The high level demonstrated in the King's Cup final match in May 2024 between Al-Hilal and Al-Nasr is evidence of the level of competition the league has reached.
The Saudi national team's results have been generally disappointing. A review of the tournaments in which the Saudi national team has participated since the beginning of its sports project to date clearly reveals that its performance has not met expectations, given the investment made in the sports sector.
In the 2023 AFC Asian Cup, the team was eliminated in the round of 16 by South Korea.
The World Cup qualifiers were not much better, with the Saudi team finishing third, far behind Australia and Japan. This indicates that the Saudi team is still far from competing with the traditional Asian heavyweights.
Returning to the re-evaluation of the Saudi sports project, we clearly see that the project has had positive results from a sporting perspective for Saudi teams, who have been able to perform well.
The level of competition and rivalry was also high, which was clearly reflected in the increased interest in the league in general and its viewership. This also helped in increasing investment.
The Saudi League has become the undisputedly strongest Asian league, and the overall results of Saudi teams in continental tournaments confirm a greater ability to compete and win.
However, this progress, in which foreign players played a major role, was clearly reflected in the poor performance of the Saudi national team.
From an economic perspective, it may be difficult to judge the Saudi sports project, as we would need to refer to numerous sources and figures.
However, there is no doubt that the sports project has led to an increase in the sources of entertainment, as well as increased investment and tourism, but it has failed to improve the performance of the Saudi national team.
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