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Rabat – Football stars and long-standing rivals Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi are set to lock horns today at the King Fahd Stadium in Saudi Arabia at 6 pm GMT+1.
The much-anticipated friendly game will see French club Paris Saint-Germain going head-to-head with a Saudi Pro League representative team consisting of players from Al Hilal and Al Nassr, including Al Nassr’s newest addition Portuguese footballer Ronaldo.
The game, which is part of the Saudi sports festival “Riyadh Season,” will be broadcasted live on BeIN Sports channels. The match will also be streamed live on huge screens in New York’s Times Square and Riyadh Boulevard, according to Al Arabiya.
The Riyadh Season Cup exhibition game will mark Ronaldo’s debut with Al Nassr. The Saudi club sealed the Portuguese player’s transfer deal for a salary of £173 million (MAD 2.14 billion) in December 2022.
While Ronaldo was set to make his first appearance in Al Nassr’s jersey in early January, his debut was put on hold due to a two-match ban he received in 2022 before terminating his contract with his former club Manchester United.
Read also: Saudi Arabia’s Al-Nassr Officially Unveils Cristiano Ronaldo in Grand Ceremony
Besides the two-match suspension that he had to serve with Al Nassr, Ronaldo’s debut was also postponed because of the Saudi club’s foreign players’ quota issue.
The Saudi club later terminated Vincent Aboubakar’s contract by “mutual consent,” paving the way for the registration of Ronaldo.
While today’s game might seem nothing more than a friendly encounter, demand for tickets has been extremely high among football fans, reaching more than 2 million ticket requests online, Reuters reported.
