Al Shabab’s journey throughout Riyadh to face Al Nassr on Friday evening will likely be a high-stakes affair.
The White Lions are sixth within the Roshn Saudi League because it stands however nonetheless harbour ambitions of breaking into the highest 5 by season’s finish. Al Nassr, in the meantime, need to keep up a correspondence with the highest three and snap within the RSL.
Thus, there’s a lot on the road at Al Awwal Park, with reward for the victors and severe repercussions for the losers, however the strain of a metropolis derby received’t faze two of a very powerful protagonists on both facet.
Intriguingly, Al Nassr’s Marcelo Brozovic and Al Shabab’s Giacomo Bonaventura are not any strangers, both to one another or to peak-pressure soccer.
For 5 years, the 2 shared considered one of world soccer’s most mythologised arenas, Milan’s San Siro, on both facet of the fierce Milan Derby, in any other case generally known as Derby della Madonnina.
Brozovic known as Inter Milan residence for 9 seasons from 2015 to 2023, whereas Bonaventura had six years on the opposing facet with AC Milan, from 2014 to 2020.
The golf equipment share a genuinely revered footballing rivalry, one which splits the northern Italian metropolis in two. Due to this fact, to play within the sport is to compete underneath probably the most intense of spotlights.
The pair loved some bruising battles throughout the years, as each match involving the 2 Milan groups tends to be. No inch is given, and each contest is fierce.
“The derby is incredible, I’ll always remember those I skilled, with the total stadium,” Bonaventura as soon as advised La Gazzetta dello Sport. “It’s a novel emotion that stays with you without end.”
Regardless of their five-year crossover in Italy’s trend capital, the opposing midfielders shared the pitch solely 5 groups, with Brozovic claiming bragging rights with two wins to Bonaventura’s one (the opposite two fixtures led to stalemates).
The Croatian, , even managed to search out the online in considered one of their most memorable current encounters, scoring Inter’s first aim in February 2020 as they overturned a 0-2 deficit to safe a memorable 4-2 win.
It was Brozovic who gave Inter their lifeline again into the sport, by way of a rasping volley from the sting of the world. It was good so good, the truth is, that he later described it as the very best aim of his profession.
“We had been two targets down, I watched the ball come down and I hit it with my left foot on the volley,” he advised Inter Milan’s Matchday Programme again in 2023. “It was a superb aim and an exhilarating second. I used to be deeply completely satisfied.”
Including to the deep Milan connection of this week’s RSL encounter, each gamers featured within the Milan Derby underneath ; he was within the Inter dugout in the course of the 2016-17 season earlier than occupying the identical place at AC Milan from 2019 to 2024.
When Bonaventura left the latter, for Fiorentina, the confrontation with Brozovic continued. Nonetheless, once more it was Brozovic who got here out on high, with Inter successful three of their 4 clashes.
Bonaventura did nonetheless make a mark, although, along with his aim incomes Fiorentina a well-known 1-0 victory on the San Siro in 2023. He later described the strike, and win, as “pure adrenaline”.
Now, Bonaventura and Brozovic resume hostilities within the Saudi high flight, and simply as they had been in Italy, the duo are pivotal gamers for his or her respective RSL sides.
Brozovic is the tempo setter for Al Nassr, patrolling and controlling midfield with all of the guile and expertise of a participant that made 330 appearances for considered one of Italy’s largest golf equipment.
All the things goes by way of Brozovic, who acts because the conduit between defence and assault.
No participant in Al Nassr yellow comes near the midfield grasp for complete passes this season: Brozovic has made 1568 by way of to the tip of Matchweek 23, 505 greater than centre-back Mohamed Simakan, who is available in second.
It’s no shock, then, that he has additionally created probably the most probabilities for Pioli’s facet this season, with 51. 4 of these have ends in assists for targets.
As Al Nassr eye a turnaround in kind and fortunes – to be truthful, they sit solely 10 factors off high spot with 11 rounds remaining – it’s to Brozovic that they’ll look to to set them in movement.
Bonaventura, in the meantime, is turning into simply as essential for Al Shabab in his first season within the RSL.
Rocked by the , Al Shabab have struggled for consistency underneath his alternative, .
They’d gone win-defeat for eight straight video games by way of January and February however, in triumphing in opposition to Taawoun and Damac of their previous two outings, they had been capable of string two victories collectively for the primary time since November.
It retains in contact with the highest 5; they lie eight factors off Al Ahli.
Bonaventura, capped 18 instances by Italy, remains to be searching for his first aim of the marketing campaign, however is doubtless exhibiting his price, with 25 probabilities created and a string of spectacular performances underneath his belt.
Final outing, in opposition to Damac, he was a continuing risk, and will simply have damaged his RSL duck, had been it not for a few agonisingly slender misses and an early header hitting the woodwork.
Bonaventura completed the sport with seven touches contained in the opposition penalty space, the equal most of anybody within the match, whereas he additionally had six passes into the ultimate third.
Getting ever nearer to that first aim, lastly snapping that drought at Al Nassr on Friday can be poetic timing. Additionally, it could give each himself and Al Shabab an enormous shot within the arm, whereas delivering one other blow to their cross-capital foes.
Town and the colors might need modified for Brozovic and Bonaventura, however when Al Nassr welcome Al Shabab to their residence patch, the stakes are arguably simply as excessive.