Saudi Arabia quietly shelves futuristic NEOM World Cup stadium

Saudi Arabia is quietly shelving plans for one of its most ambitious stadiums for the 2034 FIFA World Cup, two sources familiar with the matter said, after delays and cutbacks to the futuristic development that was meant to house it.

The NEOM Stadium was billed as a 46,000-seat arena raised high inside The Line, a planned 160-kilometre steel and glass city that is part of the wider NEOM megaproject, Dawn reported, citing Reuters.

On hold, with no completion date

According to MEED Projects, a Dubai-based construction intelligence platform, the stadium was expected to cost $2.5 billion and is now listed as “on hold”, with no completion date. All the World Cup projects together are worth about $22.7 billion, it said.

NEOM and the Saudi government media office did not respond to questions. The World Cup 2034 Hosting Higher Authority said “substantial delivery” of construction milestones was already under way, but did not address the NEOM Stadium.

A dream scaled back

NEOM was launched about a decade ago as a centrepiece of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 plan to diversify the economy away from oil. But it has run into trouble:

• April: Yasir Al-Rumayyan, governor of the Public Investment Fund (PIF), which owns NEOM, said The Line was no longer a priority or vital before 2030, though he denied any projects had been cancelled
• January: Reuters reported that construction of The Mukaab, a giant cube-shaped skyscraper in Riyadh’s New Murabba development, had been suspended
• Last year: the PIF began shifting from costly giga-projects towards investments with faster financial returns

War and a shrinking economy

The kingdom is also under pressure from the Iran war, which has disrupted energy shipments and damaged infrastructure, while Houthi forces have attacked Saudi territory. Last week the finance ministry forecast a wider budget deficit and a 3.6 percent contraction in the economy this year after a drop in oil activity.

The rest of the World Cup

The 2034 tournament will be the first time a single country hosts the expanded 48-team format. Saudi Arabia is building or renovating 15 stadiums in five cities, plus dozens of training sites, with completion expected between 2026 and 2033.

Work elsewhere continues. The Aramco Stadium in Al Khobar is due to be finished by the end of this year and will host its first match in January. But the wide spread of venues, and delays to developments meant to host some of them, add to the challenge, a source said.

Why it matters

The NEOM Stadium was meant to be the showpiece of a World Cup designed to present Saudi Arabia to the world. Dropping it shows how war, lower oil income and the cost of giga-projects are forcing even the wealthiest states to scale back their ambitions. For Pakistan, whose workers are building many of the Gulf’s projects, the kingdom’s economic health matters directly. Read our report on the Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia.

This article draws on reporting by Dawn and Reuters.