This weekend a special mutual announcement was made by Riyadh Season led by Turki Alsheikh and Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Sport, the umbrella entity which includes Matchroom Boxing. Billed as a “groundbreaking collaboration”, it was announced the Saudi Arabian government was going to invest heavily not only in boxing as it has done in the past with Hearn but also in darts and snooker, two activities which are immensely popular in Great Britain.
Since 2019 slowly Riyadh Season has been ingraining itself in several sports including golf and motorsports. It is hard to determine in which it has invested the most but it would be easy to believe professional boxing is near the top of the list. It is no secret a number of fights in the last six years have only taken place because of the heavy investment Riyadh Season has made in those events. From the two Dmitry Bivol vs Artur Beterbiev fights to Anthony Joshua vs Francis Ngannou to the recent Saul “Canelo” Alvarez vs Terence Crawford mega event at Las Vegas, Nevada’s Allegiant Stadium, the fans, fighters and co-promoters have accepted none of those fights would have happened without Riyadh Season.
Along with these fights but many others as well, Riyadh Season has also become a partner in Zuffa Boxing, the UFC’s Dana White foray into boxing as well as big supporter of the amendment to the Muhammad Ali Act so in a sense a foreigner looking to influence United States’ legislature.
Although there is a small wave of Saudi Arabian fighters starting to make on the global boxing stage, obviously propelled by Turki’s support, the country and even the region is known for its boxing prowess.
So why would a country with no real boxing history get so involved in the sport?
The consensus is the country’s government, an absolute monarchy, is trying to counterattack the bad press they have gotten in the recent past regarding human rights issues. Attacks on free press, dissent and expression as well as the treatment of migrants, a controversial penal code and executions for minor offenses have all been reasons for criticism.
A simple search in any internet engine would crop up a vast number of different examples of all these accusations.
For decades boxing has been known as the “red light district of boxing”. It is not the first time a controversial figure has played a prominent part in the sport. Many mention Don King’s two murders, one a justifiable homicide and the other reduced to voluntarily manslaughter which he served some time for, as examples of the aforementioned. During the 70 and 80s along with Top Rank’s Bob Arum, King was the most important and successful promoter in the sport.
Money attracts money and the investment Riyadh Season has made in the sport not only has benefited the fighters which have gotten the biggest purses of their career but also the promoters who handle them. So much so that the abovementioned Hearn, a big player in the sport in his own right, has publicly stated in an interview in January of 2025 that if Turki Alsheikh asked him to clean his shoes, “I would probably do it.”
Other Musings
-This past weekend light welterweight contender Angel “Tashiro” Fierro lost his cool during his comeback fight in Tijuana and was disqualified after kicking his opponent Abraham “Bombi” Cordero in the third round of a scheduled ten. Fierro was coming off the cancellation of his rematch vs Isaac “Pitbull” Cruz this past summer after not making weight.
-Also, this Saturday night in Norway, the “First Lady of Boxing” Cecilia Braekhus captured the WBC and WBO light middleweight titles by beating Ema Kozin via unanimous decision. The fight was announced as her retirement fight and she leaves the sport with a record of 39-2, 9KO.
-The nominees for the new International Boxing Hall of Fame 2026 class has been announced with Vernon Forrest, Gennady Golovkin and Steve Collins are the newest on the ballot while Jackie Nava, Naoko Fujioka and Christina Hammer also making their way into nomination for the first time.
