The opening round of the new AFC Champions League Elite Finals in Jeddah was not so much a battle between east and west as a bloodbath.
Over the course of the weekend, four quarter-finals were played, pitting sides from the Gulf against ones from East Asia. In only one did the side who had travelled from the other side of the continent progress.
The anomaly was the lone fixture not involving a side from Saudi Arabia. Al Sadd, of Qatar, and Japan’s Kawasaki Frontale, were closely matched, and had to be separated by extra time.
The rest? To say it was one-way traffic does not cover it. Between them, the Saudi giants Al Hilal, Al Ahli and Al Nassr racked up 14 goals in their three matches, conceding just one. It seems fanciful to think one of them will not win the title on Saturday night.
Such has been the domination it was tempting to think it was not a fair fight. And yet a glance at history suggests this is an aberration: East Asia has monopolised this title in the past, and this is the Gulf fighting back.
Since 2006, sides from the west have only won the title four times – Hilal twice, Sadd once, then Al Ain last season.
If, as feels likely, there is a West Asia winner on Saturday night, they will be following on from Al Ain. In which case, it will be the first time since 2003-05 – when the Champions League format had just started – that it has been won in consecutive years by teams from this side of the cntinent.
Eastern clubs – which includes teams from China and Australia – have generally ruled the competition. South Korea are the most successful nation with 12 titles, Japan next with eight, then Saudi with six.
What has tipped the balance westwards this year? Two factors are obvious: the scrapping of the rule which limited the number of foreign players, plus the massive financial investment made by Saudi clubs.
“If you look at the budgets between the two different places, they are completely different,” said Patrick Kisnorbo, who was caretaker manager of Yokohama F Marinos for their fixture against Nassr.
“I think in Japan, and in the east, they are unable to spend the money that they are here. That is No 1, but No 2, I don’t think it is a technical issue.”
Yokohama initially showed up well in the opening exchanges against Nassr. Then the dam broke, and they were unable to resist a side which has such illustrious names as Cristiano Ronaldo, Sadio Mane, and Jhon Duran.
After the 4-1 loss, Kisnorbo said it is difficult to compete against a side who have plucked players straight out of the English Premier League.
“Sometimes things are difficult, but when you come over here, every team has players who have played in the Premier League,” Kisnorbo said.
“These players from Japan are experiencing that for the very first time, if they haven’t been overseas.
“But if you look at the local competitions and the national teams, Japan are very, very good. Unfortunately, sometimes things happen like this.”
For as long as football has had organised competition, the clubs who invest the most money have tended to be the most successful.
Guangzhou Evergrande took the AFC Champions League title twice in three seasons – 2013 and 2015 – when the Chinese league was awash with cash.
Between 2006 and 2018, the west only won once, thanks to Sadd in 2011. But now the powerbase has switched, because Saudi has been offering some of the biggest salary packages in world football.
Even within the West Asia conference, there is Saudi and then the rest. The UAE at least held the kingdom at bay for a season last year, when Al Ain took the title.
They beat two Saudi teams on the way to that final, and were largely indebted to the goalkeeping of Khalid Essa and the inspired form of Soufiane Rahimi, their Moroccan striker.
This time around, UAE clubs, too, suffered at the hands of their neighbours. Al Ain and Al Wasl lost all six matches they had against Saudi opposition in the league phase.
Milos Milojevic, Wasl’s manager, addressed the point after their 4-0 loss to Nassr in Riyadh in February.
“I would like to be positive and say we can compete, and I think we can,” Milojevic said.
“[But to do so] we have to be on 120 or 130 per cent. It is known in football that, according to research, the team that spends the most in the top 10 leagues in Europe wins 93 per cent of the time. So over 10 years, they will win 9.3 times.
“So obviously, the investment Saudi is making in football is either going to crush the other Gulf countries, or push them to invest.”
The removal of the foreign player rules for AFC competitions at the start of this season has also had a massive bearing.
Captain Salem Al Dawsari and Hassan Altambakti were the two Saudi players in the starting XI in Hilal’s quarter final against Gwangju.
Al Nassr started with four Saudi players against Yokohama F Marinos, while Al Ahli had two in their game with Buriram United.
Of course, they are not the only ones doing it. Four of the five goals in the fourth quarter-final, between Sadd and Kawasaki, were scored by Brazilians.
And it is in line with Europe: Real Madrid had three Spaniards in their starting XI when they beat Borussia Dortmund in last season’s Uefa Champions League final.
The difference is the quality of overseas player Saudi has been able to attract, as much as the quantity.
When Hilal won the title in 2021, their foreign player quota – four of whom started the final - included Matheus Pereira and Bafetimbi Gomis; players who had appeared in the Premier League previously, but not with any particular distinction.
Now their challenge is led by Sergej Milinkovic-Savic, the outstanding Serbian midfielder who played over 250 games in Lazio’s midfield before moving to Riyadh.
The imports might be lavishly paid. But their bank balance has not impaired their drive, judged by the tireless displays of, for example, Milinkovic-Savic in Hilal’s win over Gwangju, and Marcelo Brozovic for Nassr against Yokohama.
“The differences between teams are not that big,” Brozovic, who is closing in on 100 caps for Croatia, said after winning the player-of-the-match award in the quarter-final.
“In each and every match, you still have to exert an enormous effort to do your best. Wherever I play, I like to win and I like to achieve more and more.”
