Just shut up and get on with the game Jack!

For almost a century, we have been fed the narrative that Europe was the home of football and the preferred destination for any footballer wishing for both fame and all the riches that the beautiful game can give you.

In fact, such has been the myopic and sometimes condenscending view of the so-called architects of football that you are not considered any good if you do not earn your salary in Europe.

Come to Europe, they say, where we have in place the best infrastructure, the best money, the best players, the best coaches ad nauseam, and we in turn will reward you with recognition and we will not consider any palooka who ply his trade in the backwaters or Third World.

Ask the greatest of them all – Pele.

Brazilian Edson Arantes do Nascimento is the best ever footballer to have laced soccer boots, yet for refusing to play in Europe, they ganged up against him to deny him the biggest recognition – World Footballer of the Year award.

But every dog has its day, so they say. And just like the powerful West is currently spending sleepless nights and squirming under the global threat of the greenback losing its lure with the advent of BRICS, Europe is also facing its own demon in the form of Saudi Arabia.

The Saudis are shelling out mouth watering dollars like you’ve never thought possible and luring some of the biggest names in global football to their Saudi Pro League by the dozen.

Players like Ngolo Kante, Jordan Hendersen, Sadio Mane, Christiano Ronaldo, Neymar, Khalidou Koulibaly, Roberto Firmino, Karim Benzema, Riyad Mahrez, you name them, they are all flocking to the sun kissed dunes of Riyadh.

Now there are reports that even Kylian Mbappe is headed towards Riyadh, and the panic stricken administrators of the world order are suddenly claiming with indignation that the attraction of the Saudi Riyal is too destructive for the global game.

Destructive to who and for who, I ask?

The Euro and the Pound were not destructive for the global game when every top player trekked to Europe, but suddenly now that the shoe is on the other foot, we are told the migration of players to Saudi Arabia is destructive.

I hope they could stop speaking in “forked tongues” and just accept that the Euro and the Pound have lost their lure and the smell of the Saudi Riyal is the way to go. They must just stop being hypocrites and deal with the unfolding Saudi phenomenal.

They predicted gloom and doom when FIFA awarded the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, just as they did when South Africa were also appointed hosts of the 2010 event, once again I say they must just deal with the migration to Saudi and stop irritating us.

What goes around comes around, yeah, karma can be a bitch sometimes. You just gotta’ accept the inevitable and think out of the box how you are going to keep television viewers interested in your game when everyone of your top player keeps departing to Saudi.