Move over, Leo Messi. Zara hatke, Cristiano Ronaldo. Our GOAT – Greatest Of All Time (loaded fanboy) – has to be Mushref al-Ghamdi. Which club, which country does he play for, you ask? Well, quick answer: he plays the real estate in Saudi Arabia. Last week, he made news by paying a nice, tidy sum of $2.6 million (about ₹22 crore) to buy a special ticket to watch the exhibition match between Paris Saint Germain and Riyadh 11 in Saudi Arabia on Thursday. So what special stuff do you get for a 10 million riyals ticket? Play, at least for a bit, in the game running alongside two of the footballing greats? It turns out al-Ghamdi got to watch the after-match awards ceremony and join the players in the locker room. One hopes there was some nice caviar also thrown in for spectator snacking.
The big ticket for the jolly game was, bless al-Ghamdi’s soul, bought in an auction for charity. But one thing leaves us a bit rattled. The day after the match, Mushref said, ‘I have little interest in football lately, because of my preoccupation with business, but when I met Ronaldo and Messi it was a wonderful feeling.’ Hmm. One supposes one could have got the same for free if one was, say, Amitabh Bachchan, who was there on the pitch to meet and greet the Big M and Big R. No matter, al-Ghamdi is our Big G. Oh, the final score? PSG 5, Ronaldo-led Saudis 3.
