Saudi agreement: Will Rafael Nadal’s heartbreak be forgiven by Spain?
“Is Rafa Nadal’s identity now apparent?”
It’s a question that fans of the tennis star have been asking on social media, after the announcement that Spain’s favourite sporting son has inked a deal to become a ‘tennis ambassador’ for Saudi Arabia.
close to the promotion
The statement Nadal made, “Wherever you look, you can see growth and progress here,” left Spaniards stunned more than the agreement he signed to “advance the development of the sport” with the oil-rich Arab nation.
Nadal signed an agreement with the oil-rich Arab country to “promote the development of the sport”, but more than his actions, it was the statement he made that left Spaniards speechless: “Wherever you look, you can see growth and progress here”. “Money buys everything?” supporters asked at first, criticising the lack of human rights in the Gulf State. Now the debate has moved on from social networks to office corridors, cafeterias and Whatsapp groups.
Jaime from Madrid, whose hero has always been Rafael Nadal, told Euronews, “I read the news at night and thought I was so tired I must have misread it, but the next day I saw it was true. The first thing I thought was: why did he sell himself? He is got a lot of money and he is won everything, he did not need it.” “It was such a hard blow that we could start counting the years from this moment: the first year since Rafa was sold,” Jaime continues.
Letters criticizing Nadal’s choice have also flooded the newspapers: “I do not understand the need to sell out like this, but I do not blame him either: when it comes to large sums of money, dignity and honor disappear,” wrote Pablo Erskine from Alcorcón in El País. “Is it really worth sacrificing principles for a few million more?” Gonzalo talked with his coworkers about this over coffee at the London bank he works for: “It is hard to be objective because for me Nadal is God, but it is clear that this is not the best thing he could have done.”
