Sports News in Five Arab Countries: A Comparative Study of Journalistic Role Performance Across Platforms and Sources.

This study investigates journalistic role performance in sports news across five Arab countries—Egypt, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—focusing on three roles: loyal-facilitator, watchdog, and infotainment. Analyzing 874 sports news stories from print, broadcast, and online outlets in 2020, the research finds that the UAE exhibits the highest level of loyal-facilitator (loyalist) content, while Qatar leads in infotainment, with domestic news generally more loyalist than foreign news. Political sources predict greater loyalist coverage, whereas multiple viewpoints are associated with increased watchdog and infotainment roles; sports sources, however, show no significant impact on any role. The findings suggest that, similar to Western contexts, Arab sports journalism predominantly fulfills a loyalist cheerleader role toward national elites, with limited watchdog criticism, and that sports journalism in the Arab region is both heterogeneous and context-dependent across countries and media platforms.