Sports fans in Saudi Arabia have never had it so good. From football to motorsports and mixed martial arts, every week of the 2023/2024 season seems to feature another high-profile international event.
Real Madrid, Inter Milan and Manchester City have all recently competed and won silverware in Saudi Arabia’s capital. Riyadh is also the stage for Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi to rekindle old rivalries as Al-Nassr take on Inter Miami on Thursday night.
Meanwhile, last weekend saw the sixth hosting of the Diriyah E-Prix at the UNESCO World Heritage site.
The hits keep coming from the world of boxing, too. Oleksandr Usyk will take on Tyson Fury for the undisputed heavyweight crown, while Anthony Joshua will tussle with former UFC champion-turned-boxer Francis Ngannou in the capital.
Tennis championships, a WWE main event, and an upcoming snooker championship that introduces the sport’s first 167-maximum breaks, are all part of the action.
Next up is the “PFL vs Bellator: Champs” card in Riyadh.
With thousands of local fans filling stadiums and millions watching worldwide, Riyadh Season is a chance to do something different. Sports organizations can get creative and establish themselves with new fans. And in the case of the Saudi Arabia-backed Professional Fighters League, this could be the launch pad they need.
Since taking over rival MMA brand Bellator, the PFL has been watched with intrigue. Both brands have been distant competitors to the all-conquering UFC. The roster of Dana White’s organization is currently untouchable when it comes to superstars. Conor McGregor, Islam Makhachev and Jon Jones are household names with millions of fans and viewers.
But while the PFL/Bellator tie-up cannot compete with this star power yet, the organizers fully understood the brief when putting together their Feb. 24 card at Riyadh’s Kingdom Arena.
They will have four co-main events in the lineup. This approach will pit the champions and top contenders from each organization against each other.
Rather than rely on one or two big draws in the main events, PFL/Bellator has emptied its entire roster of stars onto the Feb. 24 card to ensure every fight is a banger. It is a bold strategy and one that captures the essence of Riyadh Season’s “Big Time” tagline.
It is a sentiment shared by Turki Alalshikh, chairman of the General Entertainment Authority, who reportedly said: “Riyadh Season is putting on some of the biggest fight events around, and the PFL Champions vs Bellator Champions certainly belongs in that category.”
In recent weeks, PFL/Bellator has been winded by stars jumping ship to the UFC. Former PFL champion Kayla Harrison entered free agency before signing to fight former bantamweight queen Holly Holm at UFC 300. This followed a similar recent switch by Bellator’s much-lauded Michael “Venom” Page, who will take on Kevin Holland at UFC 299.
Setbacks like these will always happen. The PFL/Bellator matchmakers would likely have had both fighters on the Saudi Arabia card. But the brand, or brands as there is still no definitive name for the merger, pulled out all the stops for the Riyadh event.
And given how challenging the organization of the first Saudi Arabia UFC card has been, the prospective “co-leaders” in the MMA space realize they had to do something original and exciting for fans to be worthy of a place at the Riyadh spectacle. For now, the PFL can consider the Kingdom as a place where they have a home advantage with Middle Eastern fans. It will be intriguing to see where it goes from here.
