Joao Cancelo joins Al Hilal from Manchester City in $28m deal

Saudi champions sign right-back as Saud Abdulhamid closes in on a move to Roma

Joao Cancelo has won three Premier League titles but has not played for Manchester City since the 2022/23 season. Getty Images

Saudi Pro League champions Al Hilal on Tuesday night confirmed that Portugal international full-back Joao Cancelo has joined them from Manchester City in a deal reported to be worth $28 million.

The club posted a video on their official account on X, formerly Twitter, showing Cancelo wearing Hilal's strip, with a caption reading “Joao Cancelo rises from the heights of the planet ... to #AlHilal” and a hashtag saying “#CanceloIsHilali”.

A voice-over on the video announced: “Attention! Attention! From the heights of global football, having graced the greatest club on the planet, a new star has arrived.”

The video ends with a legend behind the player that reads “Cancelo Is Blue”.

They also added another post with a picture of Cancelo holding up his shirt with the squad number 27 on it with the caption “Al Hilal is his destination and the story to be continued”.

Hilal were in the market for a new right-back as Saudi international Saud Abdulhamid's historic move to Italian club Roma was confirmed by the Italian club on Tuesday night.

Abdulhamid, 25, is the first Saudi footballer to complete a permanent switch to a club in one of Europe's top five leagues.

The Riyadh giants, who went unbeaten to win the SPL and King's Cup double last season, identified Cancelo as the player they wanted to replace Abdulhamid.

The National understands that Hilal president Fahad bin Nafel travelled to Paris to complete a deal for the Portuguese full-back, with Hilal offering 30-year-old Cancelo a three-year contract.

Cancelo joined City from Juventus in 2019 and soon established himself as one of the finest full-backs in the Premier League. However, months after signing a new contract in 2022, the Portugal international had a disagreement with manager Pep Guardiola and was sent on loan to German club Bayern Munich for the second half of the 2022/23 season.

Cancelo then spent last season on loan at Barcelona, becoming a regular starter for the Catalan giants, although financial restrictions always made a permanent move unlikely.

Guardiola said earlier this month that Cancelo could still have a future at City, but he was omitted from the first two squads of the new Premier League season and excluded from the FA Community Shield.

Cancelo made 154 appearances for City, scoring nine goals and creating 21 assists. He won three Premier League titles, one FA Cup, and one League Cup. The full-back has also won league titles in Portugal, Italy, and Germany with Benfica, Juventus, and Bayern respectively.

Cancelo made his debut for Portugal in September 2016 and has made 58 appearances for his national team, winning the 2018/19 Uefa Nations League. He was a regular starter at this summer's European Championship in Germany as Portugal reached the quarter-finals.

Cancelo will be Hilal's first major signing of the summer and will be joining a star-studded squad, including the SPL's record signing Neymar, Serbian striker Aleksandar Mitrovic, Brazilian winger Malcom, Portuguese midfielder Ruben Neves, Moroccan goalkeeper Yassine Bounnou, and Serbian midfielder Sergej Milinkovic-Savic.

Hilal have made an impressive start to the season by dominating rivals Al Nassr to win the Saudi Super Cup and starting their league title defence with a 3-0 win at Al Okhdood.

City, meanwhile, have started their own league title defence with successive victories over Chelsea and Ipswich Town.