Why are Gulf countries in bad shape in sports? (Photo- GETTY)
Gulf Countries are Striving for Success In Sports: Gulf countries Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which are among the richest countries in the world, are spending money like water to establish their dominance in the world of sports. From buying big European football clubs like Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) to hosting Formula One races, golf tours and the FIFA World Cup, these countries have spent billions of dollars on sports. Despite this, when it comes to the performance of our national teams at the international level, even this immense money and world class facilities are not able to bring them great success. The shameful performance of both Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the group stage of the FIFA World Cup 2026 and their early exit from the tournament is the latest and biggest proof of this. In such a situation, the biggest question is that why are Gulf countries proving to be laggards in international sports even after investing billions of dollars?
Focus on infrastructure, grassroots talent missing
A large part of the sports strategy of the Gulf countries has been inspired by ‘sportswashing’. This means that the country is paying more attention to hosting big international events to improve its image and promote tourism. Like Qatar hosted the FIFA World Cup 2022. At the same time, now Saudi Arabia is busy in preparations. These countries build gleaming stadiums and training centers overnight, but lag behind in grassroots development. This means that these countries are still far behind in preparing players at the grassroots level. It takes decades to build a strong sports ecosystem in any country, which cannot be bought immediately with just huge investments.
Expenditure on foreign players for domestic league
Saudi Arabia has included the world’s most expensive footballers like Cristiano Ronaldo, Neymar and Karim Benzema in its clubs to make its domestic football league Saudi Pro League one of the most talked about leagues in the world. This strategy gave the league recognition in the world, but it caused a major loss to the local players. Due to the arrival of expensive foreign stars, Saudi Arabia’s own young and local players are not getting much time to play in matches. When the top players of the country sit on the bench in their own league, then it is not a big deal for the national team’s performance to decline at the international level.
Players not playing in foreign leagues
Players from Europe, South America or Africa play in the world’s biggest and toughest European leagues like English Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, due to which their game improves. But the situation is completely different with the players of Gulf countries. Players from Qatar and Saudi Arabia get huge salaries, luxurious facilities and VIP treatment in the domestic league of their own country. Due to this security and comfort, these players do not take the risk of going out of their comfort zone and playing in European leagues. Unless players play against the best players in the world, they will not be able to withstand the pressure on big stages like the World Cup.
Small population and lack of sports culture
Compared to Brazil, Argentina or European countries, the Gulf countries have a much smaller local population, especially Qatar. Finding and developing star athletes from a small population pool has always been a major challenge. Apart from this, these countries have not traditionally developed the same culture or craze for adopting sports as a professional career as is seen in other countries.
Poll open in FIFA World Cup 2026
The group stage of the FIFA World Cup 2026 exposed all these shortcomings of the Gulf countries. Qatar’s team remained the worst in Group B with just 1 point and was eliminated. At the same time, Saudi Arabia’s team was also seen struggling in Group-H against teams like Spain, Cape Verde and Uruguay and failed to reach Super-32. This performance once again proved that you can buy the world’s best stadium, most expensive coach and biggest foreign players with money, but the passion and talent to win in your national team cannot be created overnight on the basis of dollars alone.
Bad condition in other sports also
Not only football, these countries are in very bad condition in other sports also. Talking about cricket, the teams of Saudi Arabia and Qatar are nowhere to be seen in the ICC rankings. In the ICC T20 rankings, Qatar is at 36th and Saudi Arabia is at 38th. Leave alone the World Cup, both of these teams are not able to qualify even for the Asia Cup. Qatar’s name also comes at number 81 in the ranking of hockey. At the same time, Saudi Arabia is not a part of the ranking.
How is your performance in the Asian Games?
Even in the Asian Games, these countries are seen fighting for medals. Saudi Arabia became a part of the Asian Games for the first time in 1978. But till now he has been able to win only 71 medals, which includes 29 gold medals. Qatar has also been a part of the Asian Games since 1978, but till now it has only 134 medals in its account, of which 48 are gold medals. At the same time, China is leading in this list with 3,570. India has also won 778 medals so far in the Asian Games. Not only this, Pakistan is also ahead of these countries with 207 medals.
