Saud Abdulhamid, Saudi Arabia’s first-choice right-back at the 2026 World Cup, will join the national team’s pre-tournament camp late after his vehicle was stolen in Amsterdam and his passport taken with it, the Saudi Arabian Football Federation said on Monday. The 26-year-old, on loan at Ligue 1 side RC Lens from Italy’s AS Roma, missed the Riyadh-to-United States delegation flight while officials in The Hague work to push through emergency travel documents.
What Happened in Amsterdam
The federation laid out the sequence in its Monday statement. Abdulhamid had travelled to the Dutch capital for a family break in the days before the squad was due to assemble in Riyadh, with his private vehicle stolen at some point during the trip. Several personal items were inside the car, his passport among them.
Without a travel document, the defender could not board the scheduled flight that would have put him on the delegation plane to the United States. The Saudi Arabian Football Federation (SAFF, the country’s national governing body) said it has opened parallel channels with the Ministry of Sport, the Saudi embassy in The Hague, and Dutch authorities to expedite an emergency replacement.
His agent confirmed in a follow-up statement carried by Saudi sports outlets that the situation is moving toward resolution, thanking the federation, the ministry, and the embassy for what he called a swift response. Amsterdam recorded roughly 44 thefts per 10,000 residents in 2022, with most cases classified as non-violent petty theft, according to the city’s official safety advisory for visitors.
Roma’s Pioneer, Lens’s Starter
Abdulhamid is not a peripheral squad name. He is the central pillar on the right side of Saudi Arabia’s back four and the most prominent overseas footballer the country currently has on the books at a top-flight European club. He has 26 senior caps and played at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, where Saudi Arabia famously beat Argentina 2-1 in the group stage.
Born in Mecca in July 1999, he came up through Al-Ittihad’s youth ranks and joined Al-Hilal in 2022, lifting six domestic trophies during his two seasons in Riyadh. In August 2024, Serie A side Roma announced his permanent signing for a reported fee of around €2.5 million, making him the first Saudi national to sign a permanent deal with a club in Europe’s top five leagues.
His Roma debut against Athletic Bilbao in a Europa League group fixture put him in another short list: the first Saudi player to feature in a senior continental club competition. After eight first-team appearances and one goal for the Giallorossi, he moved to Lens on a season-long loan in August 2025, a deal that carries a buy option French outlets have placed in the €2 to €3 million range.
At Lens he has been a regular this season, with the loan delivering a more consistent run of minutes than he managed in his debut Italian campaign. For the new Saudi coaching staff, he is also the closest thing the squad has to a player coming in match-sharp from a high-tempo European league rather than from a winter-paced Saudi Pro League schedule.
The Camp Calendar Donis Inherited
Saudi Arabia’s pre-tournament schedule is the same one assembled under former head coach Hervé Renard, with the new staff inheriting both the venues and the friendly opponents. The squad flew out of Riyadh on Monday for a two-phase camp split between New York City and Austin, Texas, with Austin doubling as the team’s official tournament base.
The full preparation sequence runs as follows:
- May 26: Squad departs Riyadh for New York City.
- May 30: Friendly against Ecuador in the New York phase.
- May 31: Camp relocates from New York to Austin, Texas.
- June 5: Friendly against Puerto Rico in Austin.
- June 9: Final pre-tournament friendly against Senegal, also in Austin.
- June 15: Group H opener against Uruguay at Hard Rock Stadium, Miami.
Three friendlies in twenty days is a respectable runway, but it is the only proper preparation window the new coaching staff has. The bigger problem for the head coach is that those three matches double as his first chance to set the back line with his full first-choice unit, including the right-back currently locked out of the team plane.
Greek manager Georgios Donis took over the role in late April, less than two months before the tournament. Every passing day with the squad assembled in one room is a day his staff cannot replace. If the embassy paperwork extends beyond the Ecuador fixture on May 30, Abdulhamid loses a competitive ninety minutes against a team Saudi Arabia is unlikely to play again before facing Uruguay.
The Lens right-back has been training individually in the Netherlands while documents are processed, according to his agent. How much of that translates into ready-to-play sharpness in a back four he has not drilled with in months is the harder question Donis will be asking when he picks his starting eleven for Miami.
Six Weeks Earlier, the Federation Sacked Renard
The Amsterdam story lands in a runway that has already been disturbed once. On April 17, the federation dismissed Renard, the French coach who had led the team since late 2024 in his second stint and who managed the 2-1 group-stage win over Argentina at Qatar 2022. Ten days later, on April 27, the federation announced Donis on a contract through July 2027, with the official Saudi Press Agency announcement of the head-coach appointment citing the urgency of installing a manager already familiar with the player pool.
Donis has spent the better part of a decade in the Saudi Pro League’s top half of the table, with spells at Al-Hilal, Al-Wehda, Al-Fateh, and most recently Al-Khaleej. Several World Cup squad members have either played under him or competed against his teams on a weekly basis, shortening the on-field translation period that usually swallows the first weeks of any new international job. The cost of that calculus, though, is preparation depth, and the robbery delay narrows it further for one of his back four starters.
Group H Opens in Miami on June 15
The opener will not be friendly. Saudi Arabia were drawn into Group H alongside Spain, Uruguay, and Cabo Verde at the FIFA draw in late 2025. The group features two former World Cup champions and one debutant, with all three Saudi fixtures clustered between June 15 and June 26.
| Date | Opponent | Venue | Local Kickoff |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon, June 15 | Uruguay | Hard Rock Stadium, Miami | 6:00 p.m. ET |
| Sun, June 21 | Spain | Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta | 12:00 p.m. ET |
| Fri, June 26 | Cabo Verde | NRG Stadium, Houston | 7:00 p.m. CT |
On paper, Cabo Verde looks like the assumed three-point fixture in the final matchday, but the West African side reached the World Cup for the first time after a strong CAF qualifying run, and the Saudis face them only after two heavyweight encounters that could already have decided the team’s fate. Austin’s confirmation as the Saudi base camp means the squad will travel out to all three host cities from a single Texas hub.
The Uruguay fixture sits eleven days from the moment the squad lands stateside. That is the working deadline for the back line to look settled, for the new head coach to embed his ideas, and for Abdulhamid to be in a Saudi training kit rather than at a Dutch police counter.
For the right-back specifically, the issue is sequencing. The Ecuador friendly was the camp’s earliest competitive test, the one most useful for shaking out a back four under match conditions. The Senegal friendly on June 9, six days before Uruguay, may now be the first ninety minutes Donis sees from his preferred starting unit, with little time to react before the group stage starts in Miami.
A Send-Off Loaded With a Royal Message
Behind the player drama, the departure terminal scene on Monday carried full ceremonial weight. Minister of Sport Prince Abdulaziz bin Turki Al Faisal led the delegation farewell alongside federation president Yasser Al Misehal, reading a message from Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman wishing the team success in the United States.
Compete with full commitment and high spirit during the tournament.
That was the line carried in the federation’s account of the message, delivered through the sports minister at the Riyadh departure terminal on Monday. Captain Salem Al-Dawsari and goalkeeper Mohammed Al-Owais spent time signing shirts and meeting young Mahd Academy prospects who had been brought to the terminal for photos, with Saudi coffee and incense laid out as the squad boarded.
If the embassy paperwork clears before May 30, Abdulhamid joins Donis’s first proper run-through and Saudi’s preparation calendar stays whole. If it slips into the first week of June, the new head coach will have spent his only assembled-squad camp running the Uruguay back four with someone else’s name on the team sheet.
