The Rondo - Saudi League

All right, fellas, fact or fiction, Saudi is better than Ligue 1

That's the most fictitious statement I have ever heard in my life

Yeah. Saudi is nowhere near. No, hell no. Ligue 1 is nowhere near the league it used to be

but, like, it is so many levels above Saudi. It's not even..

It's not even close, bro. Do you guys feel like players stay at that level, though

when they go to Saudi and come back to Europe? Do you think they can, like, stay at, like, a high club

like, when they left? or do they think they kind of level off? Well, we don't know yet, do we

Because we haven't seen anyone do it and like stay in like a top flight league

Like the interesting one would be for me, right? If Sadio Mane went back to the Premier League

he'd be nowhere near good enough for say Liverpool, Arsenal, whatever. But like, I think he could cook for like a mid table team

But damn, that's a fall off, isn't it? Like one of the best wingers in the world now

I mean, dude, Neymar and Santos. Yeah, we're going to see what he does though

But like, Neymar literally played 42 minutes. Yeah, his left knee doesn't work. Yo, I saw a video

Yeah, when he was at the... You saw that video, bro, where you can't even bend his knee down to, like, kiss the badge, bro

It's kind of sad. I obviously feel for him. It sucks. I was reading this thing, like, the Opta Power Index, which is mostly bullshit, right

Like, they're just trying to throw numbers for comparison's sake. But I think Liga Un is, like, fifth or sixth in the world relative

Like, Prem's the top, then La Liga, then whatever. MLS. Yeah. MLS is actually nine

MLS is nine. We're getting there. The Saudi league's like 70-something, bro

Damn, bro. Yeah, that's crazy. And then Cristiano's getting on telly like, yeah, man, like

Saudi's better than Liga Un, which, by the way, he has never played in. That's crazy

The same amount of money they paid for Duran is their league coefficient. You have to think about it

If we're talking about a whole league comparison, it has to be top to bottom

And what people think of when they think of Saudi is they cherry-pick like the $150 million, the $200 million, the $750K a week

that they spend on, like, 10 players. Yeah, like realistically it's like you can count the number of guys getting that on your hands. That does not mean that the league is good

They're also going to like three or four clubs. So no, there's no I lovely going McDonald's as much as the next guy

There no shot that Saudi Yeah that the thing with Saudi as well Like the PIF like absolutely loves his football But as long as it is these four teams and everyone else can go for themselves Yeah It crazy to me though that John Duran really after 12 goals in the Premier League

70 million pounds to Saudi Arabia. We did a Goal USA IG collab with a brand that's like a Colombian soccer culture publisher brand

Positors United. And there were some really interesting comments from, like, the Colombian fan

Yeah, what do Colombian people think? A lot of them. What are the streets saying? It seemed to be split

A lot of people were really upset and sad. They feel like he's throwing away the best part of his young career

which I understand. But there was one comment that really stood out to me that got a lot of likes and engagement from other people on the post

just paraphrasing. But it's like, man, I wish our players didn't grow up in poverty

so they didn't have to go and try to get as much money for all of their family as they could at this stage in his career

Not that making three or four mil a year in the Premier League is not a lot of money, obviously it is

I don't think he was making that in the Premier League. But, I mean, if you were to quadruple your income, if not more, to, like, provide for your parents, your grandparents, your extended family, your future kids

Like, if you look at it from that perspective, it's hard to blame a guy. Especially if he comes from that environment where, like, there's not a lot

And you are the primary support for your whole, you know. Your whole damn village, bro. Yeah

Do you think he's ruined his career, though? Hell no. Hell no, bro. Hell no

Think about it. He's creating generational wealth, bro. Like, maybe at Aston Villa, he was making between, what

20 to 50K pounds a week on average? Like, you know, 50K, if he's, like, lucky

Because, you know, at Premier League clubs, like, 100K, that's, like, Chelsea levels, you know, bigger levels

But for him to make 320K a week in Saudi Arabia untaxed

go play there for two years, you know what I'm saying? Come back, you're only 23 years old. He's still going to be technically, like, under 24 when

if he leaves Saudi, you know what I'm saying? So, like, he has the time to come back

have a good career in europe after maybe it not might not be like you know playing for

the big clubs you know the man cities the real madrid's but he could still end up back in the

premier league at a club like villa in my opinion yeah i agree if he does like well enough for

himself at like major international tournament like say he has a sick world cup right in 2026

you could aim higher than villa yeah do you know what i mean like he could genuinely do it i think one thing that super interesting about soccer is that it all about like player pathways right Like what we don realise is that most players

most footballers in the world have to go from bad club to mediocre club to good club to elite club

Like, think about it. Jude Bellingham is, like, the perfect case study. Birmingham, Dortmund, Madrid, right

The question is, we haven't seen, like, a player progression from young to old via Saudi yet

so the question is what happens from like one from that saudi step to the like elite step does

it exist i don't know bro underrated thing that we haven't talked about i don't know if you guys

think this is actually something that's going to benefit him but he does get to play with ronaldo

you know like there might be something to learn from that experience for him being a young guy

with ronaldo at the age that he is with them facing the competition they're going to be facing

maybe not but it could be kind of cool um i think it's i'm here for the vibes but um my contrarian

tactical brain is like this is the dumbest thing in the world because let's be honest if you can't

play with ollie watkins who is willing to like move and be mobile and sacrifice himself a little

bit for the team how the are you gonna pay play with christianos like i mean i don't know as

far as i know duran like worshipped christiano when he was a child which would surprise i don't

know he's Colombian does that mean he hates Messi or loves Messi I feel like the way he be shooting

all over the pitch he must be a Ronaldo fan that's true I think he's got some of that attitude yeah

he does but so what I'm saying is play with your heroes I get that but like does that mean that

they're gonna be able to play together I don't know man I don't know and I think people are

talking about you know Saudi being a threat to the next big clubs over the next couple years and

how do you guys feel about that do you really think that Saudi's gonna have an impact on like

how european football is if we're talking the biggest of the big they have enough money to make

these guys satiated with their wages and they're going to get even more in endorsements if you were

to play for a big manchester club or in madrid or for psg if you're looking at like your total

earnings if you play for those elite elite level clubs you're going to make enough money where

saudi might be a little more in your like weekly wages but it's probably not going to be enough to

move the needle. It also nowhere near as sexy to have like visit Saudi as a sponsor rather than Nike Yeah Like do you know what I mean One thing I am quite looking forward to though because of this is the Club World Cup Because this is a pretty good barometer of like how those Saudi teams are going to be able

to compete against European teams. Like, if you needed, like, a heat check of where you're at

like, welcome to PSG, buddy. How good would that be? Oh, my God

If a league and club just, like, smacks the living shit out of the Saudi club

I'm loving to see Al-Hilal versus PSG this summer in America, see how the game goes

Yeah. What's your prediction for that, Ghan? Knowing Saudi like you do

If we're counting like Ousmane Dembele's form right now, bro, PSG's destroying our halal, bro

What, like, are we at multiple levels? I'm saying, like, if they play a game

I can see, like, a 3-1 scoreline. Eh, it's not bad. No, Seattle Sounders better

Seattle Sounders, Club World Cup champions. Dude, that's actually a more interesting

comparison though, isn't it? Saudi and MLS. Everyone's like talking about Ligue 1

Like, I think Saudi and MLS, that would be more interesting to me. If you guys built

a Saudi's all-time 11, like, best in the league, are they beating

some of the teams in Europe? No, they're not sniffing it. No

You played Mitrovic up top? Nah, I mean, like, you've got some lads in there

who could still definitely make an impact. Like, you won't bet against, like, Benzema

or even Cristiano in a big game. Yeah, because what? Their 11 would be like, what

Joao Cancelo. Yeah. Depends how old they are. Is it Aymeric Laporte

He's still there. Laporte's there. They got... Lodi would probably play left back

Renan Lodi, who's a right back in the league. Oh, Cancelo could play right back

Yeah, Cancelo would play right back. And then midfielder would be like Malenka Vitsavic. Brozovic

Brozovic. Ronaldo is a 10. Nah, they have... There's another midfielder in that league

Yeah, the creation. Oh, they got Ruben Neves. Okay, Ruben Neves. That's a decent midfielder

You put like CR7. in Mitrovic and what, Mane? Or Benzema? Dude, stick Mitrovic on the right

Or instead of Brozovic, you could put Angolo Kante. That's still a good team. It's a good all-star team

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And let us know in the comment section, did John Duran make the right decision going to Saudi Arabia

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