Renard excludes Al-Muwallad from the World Cup list… and summons Al-Abed

Frenchman Hervé Renard, head coach of Saudi Arabia’s first national football team, has dropped Fahd Al-Muwallad from Al-Akhdar’s list to participate in the 2022 World Cup, while Nawaf Al-Abed has been called up, according to the Saudi national team’s account of the team on ‘Twitter’, the social networking site, on Sunday.
And the Saudi national team’s account states that Al-Mawlid’s exclusion came after examining developments in the International Anti-Doping Committee’s (WADA) appeal in the case before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) concerning the player.
He added: “After sharing views with the Saudi Football Federation legal department and the Saudi Football Federation lawyer, and as a result, and as a precautionary measure, manager Herve Renard has decided to exclude the player from the list participating at the FIFA World Cup Qatar, and to call up the player Nawaf Al-Abed to be part of the list”.
Interestingly, Hervé Renard announced, on Friday, the World Cup green list, which includes 26 players, they are: Muhammad Al-Owais, Muhammad Al-Yami, Nawaf Al-Aqidi, Ali Al-Bulayhi, Hassan Al- Tambukti , Abdullah Al-Omari, Abdullah Mado, Muhammad Al-Buraik, Yasser Al-Shahrani, Sultan Al-Ghanam, Saud Abdul Hameed, Nasser Al-Dosari, Ali Al-Hassan, Abdul-Ilah Al-Maliki, Muhammad Kanoo, Riyadh Sharahili , Abdullah Atif, Sami Al-Naji, Salman Al-Faraj, Salem Al-Dosari, Hattan Bahbari, Fahd Al-Mawlid, Abdul Rahman Al-Aboud, Saleh Al-Shehri, Firas Al-Buraikan and Haitham Asiri.
Interestingly, the Saudi national team is competing at the 2022 World Cup in Group C, which includes Argentina, Mexico and Poland.
Al-Akhdar will launch the fourth and final leg of its World Cup preparation program in Riyadh on Sunday as it prepares to face Croatia in its latest spell.