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Journalism of Courage
“It’s something very special,” These were the exact words that Vinicius Jr uttered after Real Madrid’s win against Real Sociedad on Thursday (February 27), where he was given the captain’s armband for the first time in his career. According to reports, there is a $1bn (£832.2m) offer for Vinicius from the Saudi Pro League (SPL). Will Vinicius, despite the recent temporary elevation as captain, want to continue in Europe, and Real Madrid, where he has time and again been the target of racist fans?
Though Vinicius, at the moment, is happy to stay at Real Madrid as per his recent interviews, he hasn’t received the prestige or the respect. He guided them to Champions League titles in 2022 as well as 2024, scoring in both finals. There is also the recent snub at the Ballon d’or awards, where the forward was overlooked for Manchester City midfielder Rodri for the honour. This led to Vinicius and Real Madrid boycotting the ceremony.
Europe hasn’t exactly been kind to Vinicius, so the reports of him considering the Saudi deal might not be that exaggerated.
According to various reports circulating online, back in 2023, Vinicius met with Saudi league officials to understand how the future of the country’s league was shaping up. After that, there was another meeting when the officials offered the Brazilian star an eye-watering sum of $1bn for his services for five seasons. They also revealed that if Vinicius agrees, he would be made an ambassador for when the FIFA World Cup rolls into the Middle Eastern country in 2034.
The Saudi Pro League announced itself to the world when the football club Al Nassr was able to lure one of the best players in the world in Cristiano Ronaldo, away from the glittering lights of Europe in 2022. Ronaldo was 37 at that time and struggling to keep up with the pace of the Premier League with Manchester United, but his signing was one of the biggest coups that the Saudi League had pulled off.
That opened the proverbial floodgates with a lot of European stars making the move to the Middle East to have a slice of the pie. Huge names such as Neymar, Karim Benzema and Riyad Mahrez came to Saudi with the league spending £700m ($880m) in the summer of 2023, putting it just below the Premier League, France’s Ligue 1 and Spain’s La Liga, according to Deloitte.
But in recent times, the so-called big-name signings have dried up with the league focusing more on younger players like former Brentford striker Ivan Toney, who went to Al-Ahli for a fee of £40m ($50m) in 2024. In the winter transfer window of the same year, Saudi signed Aston Villa’s Jhon Duran who went to Al Nassr for around $79.97 million.
The new approach, of signing young players over big names, has come from the new Saudi Pro League rules that came into effect last year. Also, signing ageing, big names did not pay dividends for the clubs. The most egregious example was the Neymar transfer which saw the Brazilian superstar playing only seven matches for Al Hilal after moving from Paris Saint-Germain for a reported fee of about 90 million euros ($98m) in 2023.
In order for the Saudi League to compete with the rest of Europe quality-wise, the Middle Eastern think tanks knew that they needed to sign more younger players rather than focusing on the past. So last year, they made some changes in the league’s squad registration rules. According to the new rules, clubs will be allowed to register 10 players who are not from Saudi Arabia and eight of the 10 players must be born after 2003. Although Vinicius Jr is not born after 2003, he is just 24, which makes him the ideal candidate to become the crown jewel of Saudi Arabia’s dreams of the future football revolution.
If you go by the Brazilian’s recent reactions after the Real Sociedad match on Thursday, he pledged his loyalty to the Los Blancos with whom he has a contract till 2027.
“After so much time here and at 24 years old, playing my first game as captain is a source of pride for me and my family, after everything we’ve been through to be here, to reach the club of my dreams and to be able to fulfill my dreams… I hope I can continue doing this for a long time,” he was quoted as saying by Goal.com, which reported the comments via Managing Madrid.
“I’m happy with the team, with being able to reach a semi-final of the Cup as captain of the biggest club in the world, it’s something inexplicable. I’m experiencing it, it’s something I’ve never dreamed of or imagined… Next game I’ll reach 300 games and I already want 400 and 500. I want to make history at this club,” he added.
