Why Is Soccer’s Most Famous Scoopster Doing PR Work For Saudi Arabia?

From the man who brought you questionable journalistic focus on a player accused of rape, comes an outright #ad for Saudi Arabia. https://twitter.com/FabrizioRomano/status/2028818183923147039 That's soccer scoopster Fabrizio Romano, taking a break from many (many) betting app ads and a Super Mario commercial to read a two-minute ad for the King Salman Humanitarian Aid & Relief Centre, a Saudi Arabian government agency focused on, well, humanitarian relief worldwide. The ad is uncomfortable to watch, even without any context: Romano simply dives into the script with no preamble and just begins listing numbers and projects. It's uncanny to watch a soccer journalist kick off his exultation of a government agency by talking about land mines in Yemen and, later, about conjoined twins that the relief organization has helped separate. This whole thing is a disaster, though hearing Romano say "five hundred forty thousand mines" in the same tone that he might talk about a transfer fee has some form of perverse appeal. The only thing missing was his trademark "Here we go!" catchphrase.