Lisandro Alzugaray had only been an Al Ahli player for eight days when he suffered an injury during a pre-season friendly game against Al Raed last summer. The diagnosis once back in Jeddah was a sprained ankle, keeping the Argentine winger out for a month.

A setback. Nothing more. Yet three weeks later, a process began that would result in his exit from the club he had left Ecuador to join.

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A letter sent by Al Ahli executives informed Alzugaray that his contract had been terminated after the club concluded his absence from training sessions “without explanation” amounted to a contractual breach. He had been an Al Ahli player for just 38 days.

The injured Alzugaray responded by beginning legal action against the Saudi club. He argued that the termination was an attempt to unjustly “get rid” of a sidelined player, someone who was taking up a precious spot on the league quota of eight overseas squad members. It was telling, Alzugaray said, that the termination had come on the final day of the Saudi transfer window.

The next stop for the wrangle was arbitration and FIFA’s dispute resolution chamber (DRC), where a dim view was taken of Al Ahli’s actions by an independent three-man panel. As well as $260,000 (£210,000) to cover an agreed signing-on fee and a month’s wages that had gone unpaid, the club — who had subsequently been taken over by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) — were ordered on February 1 to pay Alzugaray $490,000 in compensation for a breach of contract. A total of $750,000.

In a year that has seen Saudi football transformed by the arrivals of high-profile players including Neymar and Karim Benzema, there have been a litany of cases filed against its clubs at FIFA’s DRC by aggrieved former players.

Saudi Arabia’s growing influence

A total of 21 have been heard in the past 18 months, with football’s world governing body ruling against the Saudi club and in favour of the player involved on each occasion. The total ordered to be paid out to players tops $16million.

Some, like Alzugaray, have found contracts terminated following injuries, while others were shipped out because they had ceased to be part of a club’s plans.

The statements of mitigation can often include the strongest language. Take the case of Spanish defender Dani Suarez, who was accused of “violating basic standards of honesty by wasting the time” of his club, Abha. Or Cristiano Ronaldo’s side, Al Nassr, who claimed they were “fed up with the inappropriate and unprofessional attitude” of their Morrocan forward Abderrazak Hamdallah (pictured above) when calling time on his deal.

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Everton Ferreira Guimaraes, a 32-year-old midfielder known as Kaka, was even said to be in breach of contract after publishing two social media posts asking the Saudi Arabian sports minister for help after going unpaid. In the paperwork that detailed his successful claim, eventually awarded $87,000, the player accused the club, Arar, of keeping his family hostage in Saudi Arabia by preventing them from exiting the country.

Such cases were at the root of concerns from FIFPro, the international players’ union representing 65,000 members. Saudi Arabia was one of seven countries that professional footballers were advised against moving to only last year due to the non-payment of salaries becoming “a recurring problem”.

That direct criticism is known to have stung Saudi and, as a result, it is considered to be an improving, but not yet perfect, landscape. Cases reaching FIFA are known to have been cut in the past six months, although some support staff, who are not offered the same recourse through the world governing body, are still encountering issues.

FIFA has also heard a long list of payment disputes between coaching staff and clubs. Fourteen coaches have taken action through the international governing body to claw back money owed in the past 12 months alone, with Al Ahli, Al Raed and Al Ittihad among the clubs involved.

There has been a private acceptance from within the country that things could not continue as the Saudi Pro League chases a new and improved image. The quest for professionalism and respectability cannot tally with paying players late or, worse still, terminating contracts. Especially those on eye-watering contracts. Fail to pay those punctually and the attempt to lure more elite players in the coming transfer windows gets that little bit harder.

But a history of failing to meet wage obligations brings a lasting headache for Al Ahli, one of the four clubs in which PIF, chaired by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, took on a controlling 75 per cent stake in June.

Al Ahli have been repeat offenders with former players in the DRC, not to mention the 13 coaches who have chased the club for money in the past two years. There was the case of Alzugaray passed in February of this year and another brought by Tunisia international Hamdi Nagguez in July 2022. Five days after Naguez had requested outstanding wage payments totalling $335,556, Al Ahli had terminated his contract immediately, “justified by the seriousness of the player’s infractions”.

Naguez’s claim was partially accepted, resulting in Al Ahli being forced to pay $425,445 in outstanding payments and remuneration, as well as $444,445 in compensation for a “breach of contract without just cause”.

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That left Al Ahli on thin ice, a surface that cracked when Lewis Grabban, the former Nottingham Forest captain, brought his claim against the club earlier this year.

Grabban had signed a two-year deal in August 2022, but by November 2022 he had begun legal action over $400,000 owed in wages. Grabban then saw his contract terminated a fortnight later, with Al Ahli arguing that the player had ignored requests to set up a Saudi bank account for payment.

Grabban was eventually awarded $700,000, despite a claim of $2.2million, but it was the sporting sanctions included in the decision that resulted in lasting issues for Al Ahli.

Enough was enough, decided FIFA on March 8. “The chamber noted that the club had already been held liable for breaching other players’ contracts without just cause in several recent occasions. Consequently, the club shall be sanctioned with a ban from registering any new players, either nationally or internationally, for two entire and consecutive registration periods.”

That decision is now the subject of an appeal via the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), a response that enabled Al Ahli to recruit as lavishly as they did during the summer transfer window. They spent roughly £160million signing Premier League stars Riyad Mahrez, Allan Saint-Maximin and Edouard Mendy, as well as Gabri Veiga, Roger Ibanez and Franck Kessie. Only Al Hilal, another PIF-owned club, spent more.

Failure to overturn that ban, though, would mean a two-window transfer ban was unavoidable and Al Ahli would go through a 12-month period unable to recruit new players.

Al Nassr, who made the world sit up when signing Ronaldo last December, are another high-profile club with a CAS date looming.

The Brazilian midfielder Petros was awarded $2.5million in compensation after his case against Al Nassr, who terminated a four-year contract 12 months early in 2021. That dispute, initially heard last year, will resume in Lausanne on October 26.

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Al Nassr have already found themselves subject to a temporary transfer embargo this summer when they were banned by FIFA from registering new players owing to “outstanding debts” from a transfer that saw them sign Nigeria forward Ahmed Musa from Leicester City in 2018. A $513,000 settlement allowed them to resume their business this summer.

The most recent case heard by FIFA’s DRC ended up being among the most expensive. Alberto Botia, the Barcelona academy graduate, had been with Al Wehda for three years when it was claimed he was refused permission to fly back to Jeddah, following a pre-season training camp in Slovenia, owing to an expired visa in the summer that had followed the club’s relegation from the Saudi Pro League in 2021. Botia was also told by his landlord that a rent agreement had also stopped.

The Spaniard terminated his contract with Al Wehda after receiving late payments nine times and was eventually successful in a compensation claim that ran to $2.27m before interest.

An overhaul of the Saudi Pro League will likely bring a line drawn in the sand this summer. As well as PIF taking controlling stakes in Al Nassr, Al Hilal, Al Ahli and Al Ittihad, there is also Al Qadsia (Aramco) and Al Suqoor (Neom) under the control of companies backed by the state.

Everything comes back to Vision 2030, launched seven years ago by Bin Salman, a revised projection of how Saudi wants to be viewed by the world. Legal wrangles with unhappy footballers can have no place from here.

That is not to say they are afforded the same protections as they might expect in Europe’s biggest leagues. There is no equivalent of the Professional Footballers’ Association to fight a player’s corner, not in a country where the traditional trade union movement does not exist in practice. Worker councils are permitted for Saudi nationals but their powers are limited.

The establishment of the Saudi Football Players Association (SFPA) in late 2021, with former internationals Osama Hawsawi, Mohammad Al Sahlawi and Abdulmalek Al Khaibri among the founding members, is considered a first step to offer a greater level of protection.

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In its mission statement, the SFPA says it was set up “as an independent entity concerned with players’ rights” and will “harness all its efforts and resources to create a better work environment for football players within the kingdom”.

A claim for independence does not sit easily when the SFPA lists the Saudi Arabian Football Federation (SAFF) and the country’s ministry of sport among its “success partners”, and any application to be affiliated with FIFPro, as yet not forthcoming, would likely take up to two years. That application would also have to demonstrate independence from the SAFF. The SFPA and the Saudi ministry of sport were contacted for comment.

The image of Saudi football might be changing, but the legal cases that linger underline it has not always been a happy place to ply a trade for players and coaches.

(Top photo: Simon Holmes/Getty Images)