IN ANY other situation a crowd of thousands of vocal Saudis would be quickly jumped on and quietened by the security forces. Yet week in week out, in stadiums across the kingdom, Saudis cheer on teams such as Al-Hilal and Al-Nassr, both in Riyadh, the capital. “Football has emerged as a rare area for free speech,” says a Saudi professor.

Football is the one activity where the royal family can most plainly be swayed by popular pressure. In 2012 Prince Nawaf bin Faisal felt obliged to step down as head of the Saudi Arabian Football Federation when ordinary Saudis turned against him after the national team failed to qualify for the World Cup in Brazil. Last year fans of Al-Nassr tried to oust the team’s head, Prince Faisal bin Turki, after a string of defeats. They failed, but the campaign, waged by social media, was a rare example of Saudis being able publicly and freely to voice their discontent.

The election of the head of the football federation may well be the freest in the kingdom, which barely allows a vote for anything of substance. After Prince Nawaf’s resignation, Ahmed Eid al-Harbi was elected to run the federation. A former goalkeeper, he is not only the first commoner to hold the post, but has dark skin, which many Saudis look down on.

Saudi Arabia’s rulers are fearful of public gatherings, especially since mass protests swept much of the Arab world in 2011. Some of the Wahhabist clergy, who enforce a puritanical version of Islam and rule the land in tandem with the House of Saud, have criticised sport as a distraction from religion.

But the royal family cannot touch the region’s most popular one. Saudis are finding more space—in cafés and via Twitter, Facebook and YouTube—to talk about anything. If their rulers foul up football, they will be red-carded.