It has been a decent few days for Yasir Al-Rumayyan, governor of PIF, the Saudi Arabian sovereign wealth fund.
PIF owns 80 percent of Newcastle United, who will play in the Champions League after securing a top four slot with a draw against Leicester on Monday night. Al-Rumayyan, the club chairman, was on the pitch in a jacket lined with black and white stripes and wearing a pair of football boots. He was understandably delighted.
As PIF owns 93 percent of LIV Golf, Al-Rumayyan - a keen player with a handicap of 12 - would also have been pleased with the outcome of the second Major of the year. On Sunday in Rochester, upstate New York, Brooks Koepka, one of LIV Golf’s poster players, won the USPGA Championship.
The extent, if any, of state involvement in the hands-on, day-to-day running of Newcastle United and LIV has been the subject of a lot of debate, some of it legal and some of it contradictory. But the Saudi state’s sovereign wealth fund owns the football club and the golf league, so you don’t really need to know anything else.
And prominence, exposure and, now, success, are being achieved by Saudi ‘brands’, which is surely what the vague concept of sportswashing is all about. Koepka is a great golfer, with a great back-story (the five-time Major winner fought his way to the top via Europe’s second-tier tour and has returned from physically and mentally debilitating injury.)
But the wider sporting public see someone who has sold out to Saudi money. In a popularity contest, Rory McIlroy - who has won one Major less than Koepka - would be a runaway winner and Brooks would not make the cut.
Newcastle United’s resurgence is a feelgood phenomenon on Tyneside, the home of so many passionate, wonderful fans, who have endured some tough times in recent years. There is no place quite like St James’ Park when it comes to watching football and Eddie Howe has done a truly fantastic job.
But there was a time when Newcastle United was a lot of people’s ‘second’ club, an institution that enjoyed widespread affection from the football family. Thanks to the Saudi money, that is no longer the case.
Understandably, after what they have been through, Newcastle fans will not care - they will enjoy Champions League nights, they will enjoy a possible title challenge in the next season or two, they will enjoy good football under the direction of the impressive Howe, they will - with some justification - claim their club’s model is little different from Manchester City’s.
And as he cavorts on the St James’ Park pitch and tees it up with Greg Norman, Al-Rumayyan certainly won’t care. It will be good to see the black and white jersey on the grandest stages, it is good to see Koepka conquer demons and join golf’s all-time greats.
But Saudi sportswashing is now on full spin and that can’t fail to churn more than a few stomachs.
