Al-Ittihad Secures Ritsu Doan as Diaby Replacement

Al-Ittihad are wasting no time reshaping their attack. The Jeddah giants have reached an agreement with Eintracht Frankfurt for Japan international Ritsu Doan, a deal that edges them close to securing one of their main targets of the current window, according to Saudi newspaper Al-Riyadiah.

Only the final contractual details stand between Doan and a move to the Roshn League. The framework of the transfer is in place, the clubs aligned, the paperwork now catching up with the negotiations.

This is not a luxury signing. It is a response.

Moussa Diaby’s departure to Bayer Leverkusen left a clear hole in Al-Ittihad’s frontline, stripping “the Dean” of one of their most prominent attacking figures. The exit forced the club back into the market for a forward who could not only cover those responsibilities, but expand the team’s range in the final third.

Doan fits that brief.

Capable of operating across several attacking positions, the Japanese international offers versatility and a different kind of threat. He arrives with a wealth of European experience, shaped by years of high-level football on the continent, and that profile has made him a natural candidate for an Al-Ittihad side in the middle of a rebuild.

The club are moving away from the names that defined the previous project and assembling a group more closely aligned with the current coach’s ideas. Doan’s expected signing slots neatly into that strategy: flexible, technically sharp, tactically adaptable.

Al-Riyadiah reports that the agreement between Al-Ittihad and Eintracht Frankfurt is already done, with both parties now simply working through a handful of formalities before the move becomes official. Inside the club, the feeling is that the announcement is a matter of timing, not doubt.

This transfer is part of a wider recruitment drive after a summer of upheaval in Jeddah. The hierarchy want to hand their coach a squad capable of playing with a new identity, one that can attack in different ways and cope with the demands of a reshaped domestic landscape.

Doan stands on the verge of succeeding Diaby in the Al-Ittihad squad, tasked with injecting fresh energy and ideas into the attack. Supporters of “the Dean” now wait for the official confirmation—and for the moment the Japanese playmaker steps into a project that is being rewritten in real time.