13 Dec 2023

Auckland City line up at FIFA Club World Cup in Saudi Arabia

From First Up, 5:38 am on 13 December 2023

Auckland City will line-up this morning against a couple of the biggest names in football as they open the FIFA Club World Cup in Saudi Arabia. City will take part in the tournament for the 11th time and this morning they meet Saudi Pro League club Al-Ittihad. The Saudi Pro League is the league that's spent more than a billion dollars on players this year including the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo & Neymar, and Al-Ittihad contains former Real Madrid star Karim Benzima and French World Cup winner N'Golo Kante. While those players are earning hundreds of millions of dollars, Auckland City midfielder Mario Ilich is a full-time sales rep outside of football. He's going to the tournament for the third time and says they're not intimidated by the players they'll face.