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Club give itinerary details of Newcastle United squad trip to Saudi Arabia

2 years ago
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Sunday morning has seen the club confirm details of the first team squad’s trip to Saudi Arabia.

The Newcastle United team and coaching staff are as we speak, flying to Jeddah, which is around a six hour flight.

The club confirming that the warm weather training camp will last until they fly back next Saturday, ten days before the next match against Everton, at St James Park on Tuesday 8 February.

The club’s announcement keen to stress that plenty of other European clubs make similar warm weather training trips to Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Middle East.

Sky Sports had revealed Newcastle were to play against Saudi Pro League leaders Al Ittihad as part of the trip. However, the club stating that this will be a behind closed doors friendly. Which doesn’t quite fit in with those who claim that this trip is all about maximising exposure of Saudi Arabia alongside Newcastle United. Playing in front of a crowd would surely have been the way to go for that.

The Saudi Arabia PIF have tweeted their welcome to the visit, the PIF owning 80% of Newcastle United.

A lot of media predictably speculating on whether there will be other elements to this trip to Saudi Arabia, beyond the Newcastle United squad training, playing a friendly and generally relaxing and recovering after a tough schedule and a lot of injuries and Covid cases recently.

Newcastle United official confirmation:

‘Newcastle United’s first team squad are travelling to Saudi Arabia for a week-long warm weather training camp following Saturday’s victory at Leeds United.

Eddie Howe’s side are currently en route to Jeddah, on the country’s western Red Sea coast, and will return to the UK on Saturday, 29th January ahead of their next Premier League fixture against Everton on 8th February.

As part of the visit, the Magpies will play a behind-closed-doors training match against Saudi Pro League leaders Al-Ittihad on Friday, 28th January (time TBC).

The training camp will be the club’s first visit to Saudi Arabia since it was acquired by a consortium consisting of PIF, PCP Capital Partners and RB Sports & Media in October 2021.

A number of European clubs have taken advantage of the Middle East’s warmer climes for training camps in recent years, while Spanish sides FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atlético Madrid and Athletic Bilbao have all visited Saudi Arabia this month as part of the Supercopa de España competition.’

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