Al-Hilal Went Unbeaten and Still Lost the League

Al-Nassr won the 2025-26 Saudi Pro League with 86 points, two clear of an unbeaten Al-Hilal. Last year’s champions, Al-Ittihad, opened with a 5-2 win at Al-Okhdood and finished fifth, 31 points back.

The league had sold the 2025-26 fixture list as a bang of derbies and a title defense. The dates did their job. The plot they advertised did not.

Al-Ittihad Sacked Its Double-Winning Coach After Four Games

Al-Ittihad went to Najran on August 30 as defending champions and left with a 5-2 win. Karim Benzema scored in the 4th, 51st and 60th minutes. Steven Bergwijn added one. An own goal made it five. Juan Pedroza scored twice for Al-Okhdood in front of 3,911 people at Prince Hathloul bin Abdulaziz Sports City.

Two more wins followed, at home to Al-Fateh and away to promoted Al-Najma. Then came the visit the calendar had flagged on Matchday 4. Al-Nassr won 2-0 in Jeddah on September 26, Sadio Mané after nine minutes and Cristiano Ronaldo after 35, in front of 53,883, the season’s largest crowd.

Al-Ittihad cut Laurent Blanc the next day. The club said it was ending its contract with the head coach and his staff and would look for a setup that matched its ambitions. Blanc had won the league and the King’s Cup the season before. His full record in 38 matches was 29 wins, five draws and four losses. He had won his first three league games of 2025-26. One home defeat ended the job.

THE TITLE DEFENSE, DATE BY DATE

1. August 30, 2025: Al-Ittihad win 5-2 at Al-Okhdood, Benzema with three.
2. September 26, 2025: Al-Nassr win 2-0 in Jeddah, the season’s biggest crowd.
3. September 27, 2025: Al-Ittihad ends Blanc’s contract after four league matches.
4. October 24, 2025: Al-Hilal win the first Clasico 2-0 at Alinma Stadium (46,542).
5. May 21, 2026: Al-Ittihad finish fifth on 55 points; Julián Quiñones hits a hat-trick in a 5-1 win for Al-Qadsiah on the last day.

Sérgio Conceição took over in October. The Tigers still made the AFC Champions League Elite playoff round. They also spent the spring watching a title race that no longer included them.

A 5-0 in Buraidah Opened the Championship

The same weekend the champions were putting five past Al-Okhdood, Al-Nassr went to Al-Taawoun, the side the league had called one of last season’s biggest performers, with a kind early run. João Félix scored in the 7th, 67th and 87th minutes. Ronaldo converted a penalty. Kingsley Coman scored 60 seconds after that penalty. It was 5-0.

Jorge Jesus had been hired on July 14 after Stefano Pioli left by mutual consent. The new coach’s first league statement was a road hammering. Al-Taawoun, who had reached the AFC Champions League Two semi-finals in 2024-25, recovered enough to finish sixth on 53 points and return to Asia. They never looked like the early spoiler the calendar implied.

THE OPENING ROUND THE LIST HAD SOLD

• Al-Ahli 1-0 NEOM: Ivan Toney scores in the 23rd minute in Jeddah, 40,438 in the ground, on August 28.
• Al-Hilal 2-0 Al-Riyadh: Muteb Al-Harbi and Malcom score on August 29 in Riyadh.
• Al-Taawoun 0-5 Al-Nassr: Félix’s hat-trick leads the night the title race actually starts.
• Al-Shabab 1-4 Al-Khaleej: Abderrazak Hamdallah’s home-heavy start begins with a hiding.
• Al-Okhdood 2-5 Al-Ittihad: the champions’ last easy night of the season.

Al-Nassr then won its first 10 league matches, a Saudi Pro League record, before anyone caught them. A 16-match winning run, the longest of the season, sat inside that year. The winter block the league had billed as brutal, Al-Ahli away, Al-Qadsiah at home, Al-Hilal away, Al-Shabab at home, did not knock them out of first.

The Clasico on Matchday 6 Went to Hilal

Al-Hilal’s early tests were the ones the league underlined when those opening dates landed: Al-Qadsiah at home, Al-Ahli in Jeddah, then the Clasico at Al-Ittihad on Matchday 6. Simone Inzaghi had arrived on June 4. The Clasico, on October 24, ended 2-0 to the visitors. Mahamadou Doumbia put through his own net. Marcos Leonardo scored the second. Kalidou Koulibaly had already hit the bar of the night with an early header.

Al-Hilal did not lose another league match either. They did not lose one all season. The Clasico was supposed to tilt the year. It became another win in a pile of them, and it still was not enough.

Al-Nassr had already taken their Jeddah point from Al-Ittihad a month earlier. The two advertised heavyweight trips to the champions, Matchday 4 and Matchday 6, both ended 0-2 to the visitors. Al-Ittihad’s home ground, which the list had treated as a gate, turned into a turnstile.

Thirty-Four Games Without a Defeat, Still Second

Al-Hilal’s league line was 25-9-0. Eighty-five scored, 27 conceded, 84 points. Zero losses. Nine draws. Those draws are the whole gap. Al-Nassr lost four times and still finished two points in front, because they only drew twice and they scored 91.

FBref’s season log gives Al-Nassr 28 wins, two draws and four losses. Al-Ahli, the AFC Champions League holders at the start of the year, won 25 and finished third on 81. Al-Qadsiah won 23, scored 83, and finished fourth on 77, with the golden boot in the building.

THE 2025-26 ROSHN SAUDI LEAGUE, TOP EIGHT

Across 306 matches the league scored 921 goals, 3.01 a game. Total crowds were 2,328,726, an average of 7,736, with a low of 193 for Al-Riyadh against Al-Khaleej on February 14. The 2024-25 season the league had quoted when it launched this calendar, 2.5 million in the stands, 183 broadcast partners, international sponsorship up 200 percent, was a different year. This one was slightly smaller in the seats and much tighter at the top.

What Happened to NEOM After Opening Night?

NEOM arrived from the First Division with Christophe Galtier, Alexandre Lacazette, Marcin Bułka and Amadou Koné, and opened at Al-Ahli on August 28. Toney scored. NEOM lost 1-0. The first win came on September 14 at Damac, Lacazette twice, the second from the spot in the 83rd minute.

They sat as high as fourth after Matchweek 4. By mid-season they were 10th. They closed on 45 points, 12 wins, 9 draws, 13 losses, eighth in their first top-flight season. Lacazette finished with 11 league goals and four assists. FBref logged a home average of 1,869 at King Khalid Sport City in Tabuk.

Galtier kept the job. The striker, talking during that first year, did not dress it up.

We have a fairly young team, so we also lack confidence at times. We struggle to manage our weak moments, and that’s one of the reasons why we’re inconsistent. It’s just the beginning, but the project is taking shape. It can’t all be done in one season.

Alexandre Lacazette, NEOM forward, Roshn Saudi League

By Matchweek 7 of 2026-27, paused for a long FIFA break, NEOM sat fifth. Lacazette had five goals in seven games. The side averaged 453 passes a match, up from 398 the year before, and had conceded six rather than 11 through the same stretch. In Matchweek 6 they won 2-0 at Al-Hilal and cut a 47-game league unbeaten run that had swallowed the whole of 2025-26 and then some.

Hamdallah’s Five-Goal Gap Only Grew

When the dates came out, Abderrazak Hamdallah sat five goals behind Omar Al-Somah’s all-time mark of 155. Al-Shabab had a home-heavy start. The idea was that the Moroccan would eat into the record on his own turf.

Al-Shabab lost 1-4 to Al-Khaleej on night one. Hamdallah played 14 league games, scored six, and spent weeks out. Al-Shabab finished 13th on 35 points. By April 14, Al-Somah, then at Al-Hazem, had 160. Hamdallah had 155. He ended 2025-26 on 156. Al-Somah was on 161 by mid-August.

Al-Somah, 37 that spring, treated the chase as fuel. “Of course, the number is important for me and for Abderrazak,” he said after scoring in a 2-0 home win over Al-Fayha. Hamdallah moved to Al-Taawoun for 2026-27. The record the fixture list had dangled in front of Al-Shabab stayed in someone else’s column.

May 21 at Al-Awwal Park Ended the Wait

Al-Nassr went into the last Thursday two points clear, needing a win against Damac. Al-Hilal beat Al-Fayha 1-0 the same night and still came second. At a sellout of 26,000, Mané headed in a Félix corner. Coman drove one in from outside the box. Morlaye Sylla scored a penalty. Ronaldo bent in a free kick for 3-1, then scored again. The final was 4-1.

The league called it Al-Nassr’s first top-flight trophy since 2019, the club’s 11th Saudi title, and Ronaldo’s first at the fourth time of asking. He finished on 28 goals. Quiñones took the boot with 33, the last three of them in that 5-1 at Al-Ittihad. Félix led the league with 13 assists. Yassine Bounou and Édouard Mendy shared the clean-sheet lead on 14.

THE LAST NIGHT’S LEDGER

• The score: Al-Nassr 4-1 Damac at Al-Awwal Park on May 21, 2026.
• The gap: 86 points to 84, with Al-Hilal still unbeaten.
• The wait: Al-Nassr’s first league title since 2018-19, Ronaldo’s eighth in four countries.
• The boot: Quiñones 33, Toney 32, Ronaldo 28.

For three league seasons the Saudi move had been filed as a star without a crown. That reading did not survive the last Thursday in May. Ronaldo took the ultras’ giant drum and beat time for the 26,000 still in the bowl, the 2025-26 list finally reduced to a table.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who Won the 2025-26 Saudi Pro League Golden Boot?

Julián Quiñones of Al-Qadsiah won it with 33 goals in 31 games, including a last-day hat-trick in a 5-1 win at Al-Ittihad. Ivan Toney of Al-Ahli scored 32. Ronaldo’s 28, his lowest league haul of the Saudi years, was still third.

Which Teams Went Down From the 2025-26 Saudi Pro League?

Damac (29 points), Al-Okhdood (20) and Al-Najma (16) were relegated after 34 matches. Al-Najma’s winless run reached 20 games, the season’s longest. Al-Riyadh stayed up on 30 points.

How Many Matches Did Al-Hilal Lose in the 2025-26 League?

None. Al-Hilal’s 34-match unbeaten league run was the longest of the season and covered the entire campaign. The nine draws, not a defeat, were what left them two points short of Al-Nassr.

When Did the 2025-26 Roshn Saudi League Start and Finish?

It ran from August 28, 2025, to May 21, 2026, across 34 rounds and 306 matches. The last round’s title, Asia and relegation games kicked off together on May 21 after the league set that date on May 13.