Cristiano Ronaldo’s title dream is slipping away at Al-Nassr

January 13, 2026 Oliver Obel

By the time Cristiano Ronaldo steps onto the pitch for Monday’s Capital Derby, Al-Nassr’s season may already feel heavier than the Riyadh night air. A loss to Al-Hilal would leave them seven points adrift in a league where momentum, once lost, rarely returns.

It is a far cry from the certainty that followed Ronaldo’s arrival in January 2023. His move to Saudi Arabia was framed as both a sporting coup and a symbol of ambition, with trophies expected to arrive almost by default.

Individually, Ronaldo has delivered. He has scored 114 goals in 128 appearances for Al-Nassr, according to GOAL. Collectively, the payoff has been far less convincing.

When inevitability vanished

Al-Nassr’s early-season form suggested the title race might be settled by winter. Ten straight league wins, only five goals conceded, and a comfortable cushion at the top painted the picture of a side in full control.

That sense of inevitability cracked in late December. A 2-2 draw with Al-Ettifaq, followed by successive defeats, turned assurance into anxiety. The results mattered less than how they arrived: defensive lapses, physical fatigue, and a growing sense that opponents had found fault lines to exploit.

After the loss to Al-Ahli, head coach Jorge Jesus did not sugarcoat it. “We were poor defensively,” he said, conceding his side had been second best in key areas.

Familiar turbulence on the bench

Periods of instability have not been limited to the pitch. Jesus is already the fourth permanent head coach Al-Nassr have employed since Ronaldo signed.

Rudi Garcia exited after a late collapse in the 2022-23 title race. Luis Castro followed with a second-place finish before being replaced by Stefano Pioli in September 2024. Pioli’s tenure ended within a year after domestic setbacks and an AFC Champions League semi-final defeat, GOAL reported.

Jesus arrived with pedigree, having guided Al-Hilal through an unbeaten championship campaign last season. For a time, it looked like a masterstroke.

Firepower without fluency

During the autumn run, Al-Nassr’s attack resembled a highlight reel. Ronaldo led the line, flanked by Sadio Mane, Joao Felix and Kingsley Coman, a quartet built to overwhelm defenses rather than grind past them.

Felix summed up the mood earlier this season when he told the league’s official website: “All of us are quality players, and playing all four together… things end up going well.”

That balance has since unraveled. Mane’s absence at the Africa Cup of Nations, coupled with injuries at the back, has left the side stretched. The football has become more cautious, the chances fewer, and the margin for error thinner.

The table tightens, the pressure grows

Al-Hilal have seized the opening. Simone Inzaghi’s team have won 10 consecutive league matches, flipping a four-point deficit into a four-point lead and restoring the aura that carried them last season.

For Al-Nassr, the derby now feels less like a rivalry fixture and more like a reckoning.

Ronaldo has tried to project calm amid the slide. “Football is like this,” he told Arab News after the defeat to Al-Qadsiah. “You have good moments and bad moments… and believe that things will change.”

Belief, however, is no longer accompanied by comfort. What once looked like a procession has turned into a tightrope walk, and for Al-Nassr and for Ronaldo’s Saudi chapter there is very little room left to stumble.

Sources: GOAL, Arab News