Club World Cup XI: Saudi Pro League makes case for legitimacy, PSG win without trying, and consequences of a silly yellow card

Now there's one we all should have seen coming, right? OK, a Saudi Pro League side in the last eight might not have been on everyone's bingo card, but all of the pieces were there. Al Hilal have gone about this rather well. They resisted the urge to go for a superstar after Neymar left, hired a truly excellent manager in Simone Inzaghi, and went into their clash with City with a clear game plan. Revolutionary, that.

Pep Guardiola's whole thing is that he is absolutely terrified of being counter-attacked. Welcome to the perfect storm. Here's a 3-4-3 that lovesto have a go on the break. Yes, it look extra time, but Al Hilal got it exactly right. Does this mean the Saudi Pro League is the best thing ever? Probably not, but it's a very good win.

Lautaro Martinez didn't pull many punches with his remarks after Inter lost to Fluminense midweek:

"I want to say that you have to want to be here. We are fighting for certain objectives, those who want to be here, stay, those who don’t can leave. I saw things that I didn’t like. I want to fight to win because we are in an important team, a team that we have brought back to the top and we must continue to do this," he told media after the game.

Part of that, of course, was the emotions of a captain and competitor who has won trophies for club and country. But it's also not a great look for the Serie A side, who have rather crumbled of late. All aboard the bad vibes train, everyone.

Remember Malcom? The Barcelona one? The guy who they blew some of the Neymar cash on, only for him to be an unmitigated disaster at Camp Nou? Well, he's just knocked Man City out of the CWC. Al Hilal's upset was wonderful, and led by a guy chewed up and spat out by the machine of football's global elite.

Saudi Pro League ball is not the under-appreciated backwaters where you go for love of the game, but it is nice to see a player get one back on an entire federation that panned him off.

AGENDA TIME. Right, so that's obviously untrue. There's every chance that Mbappe could score 50 goals next year, Madrid can win three trophies, and he will claim the Ballon d'Or after leading France to the 2026 World Cup.

BUT the early signs of Mbappe in an Alonso system were, well, rubbish. He didn't move. He didn't get into the box. He made the wrong runs, refused to press, and spent his 30 minutes on the pitch mostly getting mad at everyone around him. Gonzalo Garcia, who cost $0 and is 21, looked more effective, which tells you everything you need to know.

Yes, the weather is a problem. It remains absolutely baffling that no one sat down and thought "hey, maybe we shoudn't have afternoon games in the middle of the stifling American summer." Spoiler alert: this place is very, very hot.

The result has been weather delays of various kinds. Heat, rain, lightning, high winds. Perhaps the funniest, though? Chelsea and Benfica needing nearly 5 hours (or one French Open Final) to finish their 4-1 extra time win over Benfica. Figure it out, FIFA.

There's a funny story in which Gary Neville, then manager of Valencia, watched his team get battered by Luis Enrique's Barcelona in the Copa del Rey in 2016. Valencia were down to 10 men and losing 4-0 at half time. Neville thought Luis Enrique would instruct his team to slow down. They didn't, and Barca won 7-0.

It seems that the manager has aged gracefully since then, because earlier this week, against Inter Miami, he basically told his players to stop. PSG were up 4-0 at the half. The damage was done. They strolled to an easy win, eliminated the last of the MLS sides in the CWC and sort of knocked the ball around for the remaining 45 minutes. Graceful.

Talk about reckless yellow cards. Jobe Bellingham was on a yellow heading into Dortmund's last 16 clash with Monterrey on Tuesday. A booking would have earned him a suspension against Madrid and his big brother, Jude.

Naturally, Jobe decided to throw the silliest slide tackle you will ever see, scything down a Monterrey winger without a second thought, getting booked, and depriving the internet of excellent content - never mind hurting his side's chances of pulling off an upset.

Right. Five European teams, two Brazilians and one Saudi club make up the quarterfinals. Thus far, Brazilian teams have beaten a European side three times, and Al Hilal bounced City from the whole thing. Is this the parity everyone was hoping for? That depends. It's all subjective, of course. Good parity would probably be River Plate or Boca Juniors in the mix. But beggars can't be choosers, and this seems a fine mix of talent.

What do you do when you beat PSG, make it to the last 16 of the Club World Cup, build on the strength of a Copa Libertadores win, and make an immense profit by selling a player to the Premier League? Sack your head coach, apparently.

In one of the most baffling decisions of recent footballing memory, Botafogo relieved Renato Paiva of his duties after his team lost to Palmeiras. Talk on the Brazilian back pages suggested it came from the fact that the manager's defensive setup in the loss. That would seem incredibly harsh on a man who is, in all honesty, a bit of a miracle worker.

Thomas Muller is leaving Bayern. We all know that by now. His exit from the Bavarians is a sad football storyline. He is among the quintessential one-club men of football. They don't make 'em like him no more. Seeing him in the colors of another club feels wrong. This could be a remarkable Bayern farewell, though.

Well the good news, Premier League fans, is that it certainly won't be Man United. Muller has a chance at a perfect Bayern farewell, and confirmed, definitively, that he will not play for United next: "I’m not the right guy for them and they are not the right club for me. They won’t have fun and I won’t have fun so that’s not a match."

Ouch.

Well, now we're down to eight. Everyone's OG favorites, except Man City, are here. Has anything really changed from three weeks ago? Can anyone consider the variables, account for the weather, the injuries, the matchups, and say that anything other than a PSG or Real Madrid win looks likely now? Tough to say. But now those predictions will be put through their paces.