DUBAI // For vast swathes of this match, you felt like the guest who had plumped for the wrong party.
While Al Jazira and Al Ain contributed to a celebration of the beautiful game down the road in Abu Dhabi – the aptly named "Al Classico" – Al Shabab and Al Wahda plodded through a turgid encounter at the Rashid bin Maktoum Stadium.
It was not supposed to be this way. The fixture pitted the top two clubs in the embryonic Arabian Gulf League season, scorers of 18 goals between them across seven matches combined.
Yet the predicted football feast was more akin to a famine. Thank heavens, then, for Adel Al Hosani’s blunder just after the hour, when the Wahda goalkeeper spilt Carlos Villanueva’s timid shot into his own goal.
Inadvertently, it sparked Wahda into life, and from there the league leaders managed to turn around the game. Through goals from Salem Saleh and Adil Hermach, five minutes apart, as the match entered its closing stretch, the visitors gleaned what could eventually prove an important three points.
It marked the fourth time in five matches this season that Wahda have taken points from losing positions, something that understandably pleased Jose Peseiro, their coach.
“Until now, the team have done well,” he said. “Everyone has showed good spirit, a good atmosphere and good power. But to play with the feet is not enough, to have a good performance the head is needed also.
“And because of that, with this spirit, we can change the results. The team believes a lot in this moment – I’d like to keep that.”
For his opposite number, Caio Junior, the defeat was not especially tough to take. As he acknowledged, Wahda are front-runners for a reason.
“Al Wahda are a very, very good team, the best we’ve faced,” he said.
“But this was a combative game, competitive and tactical. In my opinion, the draw was a fair result, but in a match like this the small details decide the outcome.”
jmcauley@thenational.ae
Follow us on twitter at @SprtNationalUAE
The biog
Name: Sari Al Zubaidi
Occupation: co-founder of Cafe di Rosati
Age: 42
Marital status: single
Favourite drink: drip coffee V60
Favourite destination: Bali, Indonesia
Favourite book: 100 Years of Solitude
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In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Under 19 World Cup
Group A: India, Japan, New Zealand, Sri Lanka
Group B: Australia, England, Nigeria, West Indies
Group C: Bangladesh, Pakistan, Scotland, Zimbabwe
Group D: Afghanistan, Canada, South Africa, UAE
UAE fixtures
Saturday, January 18, v Canada
Wednesday, January 22, v Afghanistan
Saturday, January 25, v South Africa
FORSPOKEN
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I Care A Lot
Directed by: J Blakeson
Starring: Rosamund Pike, Peter Dinklage
3/5 stars
At a glance
Global events: Much of the UK’s economic woes were blamed on “increased global uncertainty”, which can be interpreted as the economic impact of the Ukraine war and the uncertainty over Donald Trump’s tariffs.
Growth forecasts: Cut for 2025 from 2 per cent to 1 per cent. The OBR watchdog also estimated inflation will average 3.2 per cent this year
Welfare: Universal credit health element cut by 50 per cent and frozen for new claimants, building on cuts to the disability and incapacity bill set out earlier this month
Spending cuts: Overall day-to day-spending across government cut by £6.1bn in 2029-30
Tax evasion: Steps to crack down on tax evasion to raise “£6.5bn per year” for the public purse
Defence: New high-tech weaponry, upgrading HM Naval Base in Portsmouth
Housing: Housebuilding to reach its highest in 40 years, with planning reforms helping generate an extra £3.4bn for public finances
