Top players at the football World Cup generally showcase their skills in some of the biggest and most competitive leagues in Europe.
Most of them display their wares in Italy's Serie A, the English Premiership, Spain's Primeira Liga and the German Bundesliga, to name a few, but those from Saudi Arabia seem to be the only exception to this rule.
Saudi footballers are notorious for their immobility and all the 23 players in the national squad at the World Cup feature in the domestic league.
Although Italy has also sourced its whole squad from the home-based players, nobody can doubt the competitiveness and standard of the Serie A, and the same cannot be said of the one on show in the Middle Eastern kingdom.
Saudi clubs regularly vie for honours at the Asian level against their counterparts from Japan, Korea, China and other Gulf states, but it cannot be compared to those in Italy, Spain and England.
The Saudi league is dominated by two clubs -- Al Ittihad and Al Hilal -- and they account for 16 of the squad that is presently representing the kingdom in Germany.
Veteran striker Sami-al Jaber is the only Saudi player to have tasted club football outside the country, when he spent an ill-fated and injury-ridden five months on loan with England's Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2000.
But it is not that there is any dearth of talent in the Saudi ranks, as is evident by the fact that Germany 2006 is the fourth consecutive World Cup the team has reached.
Apart from Sami-al Jaber, Mohammad al Kahtani and Hamad al Montashari have the skills to grace the top leagues in the world.
But they may not be willing, as domestic transfers themselves are big business.
Last year, midfielder Yasser al-Qahtani moved from Al Qadasiyah to Al Hilal for a whopping seven million dollars, a fee that no club in Europe would spend on him.
When the players want to play abroad, clubs in the desert kingdom are not too willing to let them go unless they get more money for their services to the big European clubs.
The national team has had more than its fair share of success at the Asian level and they have been continental champions three times-- in 1984, 1988 and 1996 -- but the players need to move out to take the next step.
The Saudis finished ahead of South Korea in the World Cup qualifiers, which is a remarkable achievement in itself considering that the 2002 semifinalists, along with Japan and China, in recent years have exported their top talents to the major leagues in Europe.
