{"id":20660,"date":"2026-02-07T03:56:40","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T03:56:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/cristiano-ronaldo-misses-2nd-al-nassr-game-amid-transfer-dispute\/"},"modified":"2026-02-07T03:56:40","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T03:56:40","slug":"cristiano-ronaldo-misses-2nd-al-nassr-game-amid-transfer-dispute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/cristiano-ronaldo-misses-2nd-al-nassr-game-amid-transfer-dispute\/","title":{"rendered":"Cristiano Ronaldo misses 2nd Al Nassr game amid transfer dispute"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Cristiano Ronaldo missed a second straight game for Al Nassr amid his ongoing dispute with the Saudi Pro League.<\/p>\n<p>The 41-year-old was absent from the squad for Friday&#8217;s match against Al Ittihad, having also not been featured in Monday&#8217;s victory over Al Riyadh.<\/p>\n<p>Sources had told ESPN that Ronaldo planned to boycott Friday&#8217;s game after not receiving a guarantee that the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund (PIF) will make changes regarding the Saudi Pro League club&#8217;s management.<\/p>\n<p>However, Al Nassr were expecting Ronaldo to take part in the fixture, sources had said.<\/p>\n<p>ESPN has reported that Ronaldo missed Monday&#8217;s win because of his unhappiness with the PIF&#8217;s help for his club in the transfer window.<\/p>\n<p>Ronaldo saw his club&#8217;s rivals Al Hilal, who are also 75% owned by the PIF, sign Karim Benzema, his former Real Madrid teammate, from Al Ittihad during the January window.<\/p>\n<p>Al Nassr won Friday&#8217;s game 2-0 to move up to second place in the league standings, just a point behind leaders Al Hilal. Fans expressed their solidarity with the Portuguese star, raising yellow signs featuring Ronaldo&#8217;s name and his signature number seven in the seventh minute at Al-Awwal Park.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a1.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0206%2Fr1611284_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=570&amp;format=jpg, https:\/\/a1.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0206%2Fr1611284_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=1140&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a1.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0206%2Fr1611284_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=375, https:\/\/a1.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0206%2Fr1611284_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=750&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Cristiano Ronaldo missed an Al Nassr match earlier this week amid a dispute with the Saudi Pro League.\u00a0<cite>Getty<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>The Saudi Pro League issued a statement Thursday warning Ronaldo that no player could influence decisions beyond his own team.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The Saudi Pro League is structured around a simple principle: Every club operates independently under the same rules,&#8221; the league said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Clubs have their own boards, their own executives and their own football leadership. Decisions on recruitment, spending and strategy sit with those clubs, within a financial framework designed to ensure sustainability and competitive balance. That framework applies equally across the league.<\/p>\n<p><strong>&#8211; Cristiano Ronaldo warned by Saudi Pro League over transfer protest<\/strong><br \/><strong>&#8211; Transfer rumors, news: Could Ronaldo return to Man United?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Cristiano has been fully engaged with Al Nassr since his arrival and has played an important role in the club&#8217;s growth and ambition,&#8221; the league&#8217;s statement continued. &#8220;Like any elite competitor, he wants to win. But no individual &#8212; however significant &#8212; determines decisions beyond their own club.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Recent transfer activity demonstrates that independence clearly. One club strengthened in a particular way. Another chose a different approach. Those were club decisions, taken within approved financial parameters.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The competitiveness of the league speaks for itself,&#8221; the league said. &#8220;With only a few points separating the top four, the title race is very much alive. That level of balance reflects a system that is working as intended.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The focus remains on football &#8212; on the pitch, where it belongs &#8212; and on maintaining a credible, competitive competition for players and fans.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Transfer funds are understood to come not from the PIF but instead from a player acquisition fund.<\/p>\n<p>The fund is overseen by the Saudi Pro League centrally and provides funding for clubs annually based on their size, with the country&#8217;s big four &#8212; Al Nassr, Al Hilal, Al Ittihad and Al Ahli &#8212; all believed to have received roughly the same amount before the summer transfer window opened last year.<\/p>\n<p><em>ESPN&#8217;s Bruno Andrade and Julien Laurens and PA contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Cristiano Ronaldo missed a second straight game for Al Nassr amid his ongoing dispute with the Saudi Pro League. The 41-year-old was absent from the squad for Friday&#8217;s match against Al Ittihad, having also not been featured in Monday&#8217;s victory over Al Riyadh. Sources had told ESPN that Ronaldo planned to boycott Friday&#8217;s game after [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20661,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football-transfers"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/r1611284_1296x729_16-9.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}