I was chatting to a family friend the other day who happens to be a training captain on the b777 for Saudia, who since retirement from flying duties has gotten into the management there. Naturally I asked about their Manchester service, the very mention of which caused a noticable wince. He said the route was doing very well and that it should never have been stopped in the first place. He says that when the route was originally operated the then station manager begged for a direct flight but was declined and hence the route failed. Now he said the intention is to increase to daily b777 flights late next year.
He also said some interesting things about the poor marketing of Saudia which he thinks is largely attitude based, and also a product of the 'jobs for the boys' mentality within the airline which sees non marketing professionals being put in charge of exactly that.