Al Nassr’s first match of 2026 ended in disappointment: hosts Al Ahli won 3–2 in Jeddah, handing the Riyadh club their first league defeat. Centre-back Abdulilah Al-Amri largely kept Al Nassr in the game, while Cristiano Ronaldo and the attacking unit failed to meet expectations. This is reported by euro-football.rureports.
In the opening 20 minutes, Al Ahli made their fast pressing count: Ivan Toney scored in the 7th and 20th minutes to put the hosts ahead. After that, Al Nassr were revived by defender Al-Amri, who struck twice on 31 and 44 minutes to level the score at 2–2 by half-time.
But early in the second half, Al Ahli regained the lead: in the 55th minute, Merih Demiral headed in from a set piece to decide the match — 3–2.
The visitors made too many mistakes on the wings. Said Al-Nasser, Sultan Al-Ghanam, Nawaf Al-Bushayl and Ayman Yahya were among the lowest-rated players: in the first half, Al Nassr’s flanks were breached far too easily. At the break, Jorge Jesus refreshed both sides, but the issue remained: Yahya failed to find his target with many passes, while Al-Bushayl lost track of Toney for the third goal and was sent off late on in a tense moment.
Inigo Martinez also looked shaky. He committed a foul before a set piece and effectively “gifted” a free kick — and Al Ahli scored the winner from that very episode. Martinez also lost his position on Demiral’s decisive header.
Ronaldo became the most criticised figure of the match. He did not fully deliver on set pieces, and in one moment raised his hand to signal the ball had gone out, even though play continued. Worst of all, Cristiano was below his usual level in attack: he made crude first-touch errors, took four shots and all of them missed the target. Al Nassr begin the new year with questions — was this a one-off dip or the start of a new negative run?
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