Kylian Mbappé and Lamine Yamal have been two of the standout gamers in world soccer, with the previous profitable the newest Golden Boot and the latter ending runner-up within the 2025 Ballon d’Or. However Cristiano Ronaldo has now taken intention at La Liga, providing a candid protection of the Saudi Professional League.
Since becoming a member of Al Nassr in December 2022, Ronaldo has develop into the face and ambassador of Saudi soccer, a nation whose affect within the sport has grown quickly. Past attracting a wave of European stars, Saudi Arabia can be set to host the 2034 World Cup. Nonetheless, the SPL continues to be downplayed compared to Europe’s high leagues.
Chatting with Piers Morgan on his YouTube channel, Ronaldo overtly addressed perceptions surrounding him and the Saudi league: “Even in a foul 12 months I rating 25 objectives. If I performed within the Premier League now, for a high crew, I’d rating the identical (as within the SPL). I don’t want to talk, as a result of they’ll say no matter they need, the numbers don’t lie. They’ll say ‘oh, it’s the Saudi league’ – they’ve by no means been right here, performed right here, they don’t know find out how to run in 40 levels.“
The Portuguese star then reaffirmed his feedback made final 12 months on the Globe Soccer Awards, the place he positioned the SPL over a number of European competitions. “And I nonetheless proceed, I repeat, the Saudi league, it’s significantly better than the Portuguese league in fact, the French league there’s solely PSG. Premier League is nice in fact, it’s the primary,” Ronaldo acknowledged.
Cristiano Ronaldo of Al-Nassr FC through the King’s Cup in opposition to Al Ittihad.
Ronaldo ended along with his boldest comment, drawing a pointy distinction between scoring in La Liga and scoring in Saudi Arabia: “Ask the opposite gamers if the league is nice. It’s simple to ask me as a result of everybody say the identical that ‘Cristiano mentioned that as a result of he performs in Saudi.’ Hear, I’ve performed in every single place, for me, it’s simpler to attain in Spain than to attain in Saudi.“
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Is scoring in La Liga simpler than within the SPL?
La Liga, historically dominated by Actual Madrid and FC Barcelona, remains to be extensively considered one of many world’s high leagues, a standing mirrored in its golf equipment’ success in European competitions, particularly the UEFA Champions League. The Saudi Professional League, in the meantime, has undergone large funding from the Public Funding Fund (PIF) to draw world-class expertise. However how do the leagues examine statistically?
Trying on the 2024–25 season, La Liga, a league composed of 20 groups, noticed 995 objectives scored throughout 380 matches, averaging 2.62 objectives per recreation. In that marketing campaign, Mbappé captured the primary Golden Boot of his profession with 31 league objectives.
The Saudi Professional League, that includes 18 golf equipment, produced 902 objectives throughout 306 matches through the 2024–25 season, a mean of two.96 objectives per recreation. Ronaldo received the SPL Golden Boot with 25 objectives, beating Ivan Toney and Karim Benzema within the race, whereas ending six behind Mbappé’s whole in La Liga.
Cristiano Ronaldo of Actual Madrid seems on along with his Golden Boot award.
For Ronaldo personally, his most prolific La Liga season got here in 2014–15, when he scored 48 objectives in 35 matches for Actual Madrid, a benchmark that will affect his perception that scoring in Spain is less complicated. With Mbappé nonetheless removed from that report regardless of profitable the Golden Boot, and Yamal tallying solely 17 La Liga objectives throughout his first 80 video games, the talk over whether or not the league has grown extra defensive or whether or not attacking high quality has dipped stays very a lot open.
