2023-05-04 00:14:00
in an unusual way Lionel Messi remained in the eye of the storm of the rivalry between Saudi Arabia y Qatar that compete on multiple levels, including investments in sports. Although Saudi’s neighboring countries have mended their diplomatic relations in recent years, they have a history of cross accusations and blockades in what is one of the hottest regions in the world.
In recent years Saudi Arabia has tried to imitate Qatar by directing billions of its petrodollars into the sports industry, a move seen as an attempt to clean up its image internationally (a practice known as sports washing). In addition to buying soccer clubs or disputing the headquarters of other competitions, in the run-up to the Qatar 2022 World Cup, the Saudi government offered Messi a multi-million dollar contract in exchange for him being its “tourist ambassador”, a kind of visible face of the largest country. and powerful of the Arabian Peninsula.
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Messi’s trip to Saudi Arabia
Last weekend, the Argentine soccer star visited Riyadh, the Saudi capital, once more with his family and missed one of the club’s training sessions with which he has a contract until June, on Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) which is owned by the Qatari state. Regardless of the reasons, this did not go down well with the small emirate that has managed the French club’s strings since it bought it in 2011. According to French media, the penalty once morest the world champion was harsh: Messi will not be able to play the next two games, train with the team or collect his entire monthly salary (which exceeds 3.3 million dollars).
Although it was speculated that Messi’s days in Paris were numbered for other reasons, the sanction for his walk on Saudi soil would have been due to the high command in Doha. Meanwhile, the issue that seems a priori to be of a sporting nature also splashes the geopolitics of the Middle East, a strategic area that still suffers the echo of the Arab Spring and the effects of the struggle for regional hegemony and for control of the markets. of energy.
The rivalry between Doha and Riyadh
The Arabian Peninsula is the largest in the world and is located in a strategic area that links Europe, Asia and Africa. However, what makes it one of the critical points of the globe is the abundance in oil and gas. Since the 1970s, the massive production of these resources has allowed the countries that comprise it to accumulate extraordinary wealth (popularly known as “petrodollars“) and position itself at the center of the global agenda by controlling the prices of what was the main source of energy.
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The kingdom of Saudi Arabia, for its part, is the largest in geographical and economic terms and is estimated to have 20% of the world’s oil reserves. Qatar, on the other hand, is the only peninsular country and its dimensions do not compare with its gigantic neighbor, which is also home to the mythical cities Mecca and Medina. However, it has the third largest natural gas reserve in the world, one of the highest GDP per capita and also played a fundamental role at the geopolitical level in the stage following the revolutionary process known as the Arab Spring.
“These are two countries that are historically very intertwined. Qatar has always been in the shadow of Saudi Arabia in some way, but in recent decades it has begun to develop a certain autonomous foreign policy.”explained to PROFILE Kevin Ary Levinsociologist and master’s degree in Middle Eastern studies from Columbia University.
“What has been dividing the two countries in recent times has to do with the power vacuum that was generated in the region from the Arab Spring. Saudi Arabia saw it as a time of threats, the need to control damage and to support more conservative forces in the region, whereas Qatar saw it as an opportunity to do just the opposite,” he explained.
Doha, for its part, was accused of supporting groups that “fought in the name of democracy or for some popular revolt.” This earned him the rupture of diplomatic relations in 2017 with the kingdom of Saudi Arabia and other countries that imposed a blockade on the emirate following accusing it of serving as a platform for terrorist groupsincluding the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas or even Al Qaeda, even through the Qatari medium Al Jazeera. “Qatar supported forces that tried to subvert and replace the existing order and this generated many tensions between the two countries that found themselves in many sources of dispute on opposite sides,” the specialist explained.
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Competition in the world of sport
On January 5, 2021, Riyadh announced the end of the blockade on Doha and bilateral relations were restored, their borders and embassies reopened. “Since then they have been rebuilding themselves. In fact, it seemed symbolic to me to see the emir of Qatar supporting the Saudis in the Argentina-Saudi Arabia match. Today there are gestures of rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia. In this new context, there are reasons to part with of part of the tension considering that a good part of the Saudi suspicion towards Qatar was due to its positive ties with Iran”, closed Ary Levin.
Their rivalry, meanwhile, moved to other areas, including the sports. Through their multi-billion dollar investments, Arab states have become major players in the world of soccer and other competitions in the last decade. The first to generate an impact was the Qatari state through its more than one hundred sports companies, including Qatar Sports Investments, led by Nasser Al-Khelaifi, who in 2011 bought 70% of PSG for a value close to 70 million dollars plus the absorption of multimillion-dollar debts.
Since then, Doha has done its thing to try to become the capital of sport until it crowned the process by becoming the first arab country in being the headquarters of the FIFA World Cup 2022, which according to private calculations would have cost him 200 billion dollars. In addition, he hired David Beckham, a symbol of international football, to be his ambassador, just as the Saudis did with Messi and something that was criticized by international human rights NGOs.
Added to the tussle between Saudi Arabia and Qatar over the figure of Lionel Messi is the dispute to host other events such as the 2027 Asian Cup, the 2030 Asian Games (Doha) and the 2034 Asian Games (Riyadh). The Saudi kingdom, for its part, is preparing to host the 2030 World Cup and in the world of football it has already taken over the English club Newcastle United in 2021.
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