In Barcelona, they remember Malcom for his tears. They flowed, uncontainable, on the night he thought all his dreams were coming true.
He was a 21 year old who had just scored his first goal for the club where his heroes used to play. He had done it at San Siro, a grand setting, in the European Champions League. And he had only been on the pitch, a late substitute, for two minutes.
It was an elegant finish, the strike to put the Barcelona of 2018/19 a goal up against Inter Milan, a neat switch on his favoured left foot and a pinpoint shot.
That’s the same cutback manoeuvre, shifting right to left to put a close marker off balance that is now a widely recognised Malcom trademark.
Last Thursday, in Abu Dhabi, he inflicted something similar on Al Ittihad’s Ahmed Hegazi ahead of the third goal of Al Hilal’s 4-1 victory in the Saudi Super Cup final.
After that one, the celebration included no tears, but not much restraint either. Malcom stripped off his Al Hilal jersey at the cost of a yellow card. He has always been an expressive footballer, exuberant in his successes, and less than stoic when fortunes have turned against him.
Those tears at San Siro five seasons ago were a snapshot of momentary fulfilment in what would be a frustrating chapter of a career that has traversed many peaks and troughs.
Its highs would include the decisive goal for Brazil in an Olympic gold medal match; a goal for Barca against Real Madrid on his clasico debut; and, aged just 20, one the finest long-range goals in France’s Ligue 1 of the past decade, the rocket he scored for Bordeaux against Dijon.
That teary night at San Siro also felt special. Malcom called his mother back home in Brazil as soon as he reached the dressing-room.
What his family are seeing now, week in, week out, is the true lift-off of a gifted entertainer, the matured 27-year-old Malcom as a consistent contributor to an Al Hilal team on the crest of a wave.
He’s back in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday for an Asian Champions League semi-final against Al Ain; he has cause to imagine it will be more fulfilling than his last excursion into the last four of a major continental competition. That was with Barcelona, shortly before he ended his stay in Catalonia.
He was a late substitute in a famous defeat, 4-0 to Liverpool at Anfield, a turnaround that erased Barca’s 3-0 first-leg advantage. The humiliation would cast a shadow over Barcelona. Malcom, bought for €41 million from Bordeaux in the summer of 2018, was shipped out, sold for a similar fee to Zenit Saint Petersburg.
And with that he joined a procession of gifted attacking players who passed in and out of Camp Nou, bought on the proceeds of Barca’s selling Neymar to Paris Saint-Germain for a world-record €222m in 2017 and never quite delivering as Neymar had.
There was Philippe Coutinho, there was Antoine Griezmann, and, briefly, there was Malcom, for whose signature Barca had gazumped Roma, and who arrived at Camp Nou beaming about how thrilled he felt to be at the club where his heroes, Neymar and Ronaldinho, had played.
His story at Al Hilal, who committed, with add-ons, €60m to prise him from Zenit last summer, is of an apprentice outshining his idol Neymar.
He has his stamp on one Saudi trophy already, with his two goals plus a dazzling back-heeled assist in the Super Cup final, and since the turn of the year has been strengthening his case to be considered among the shrewdest signings of a year of unprecedented recruitment into the Saudi Pro League.
He made an instant impact, with a hat-trick on his league debut against Abha. He’s now averaging a goal every two games across competitions. There have been half a dozen assists, and much gratitude from Aleksandar Mitrovic, Al Hilal’s leading marksman, for being on the end of several of them.
There are thanks, too, from Al Hilal manager Jorge Jesus that without Mitrovic, ruled out of the Tuesday’s first leg against Al Ain with injury, Malcom is galvanising Al Hilal’s forward line, maintaining the club’s target of four trophies by the season’s end.
They lead the domestic table by a distance, meet Al Ittihad again in the King’s Cup semi-final later this month and are favourites to reach a third successive Asian Champions League final.
Above all, the Al Hilal juggernaut is not missing the injured Neymar one jot. The Brazilian, now in the final stages of recuperation from the cruciate ligament tear that interrupted his Pro League adventure just five games after arriving in Riyadh last September, has seen his teammates build up a sequence of 34 successive victories mostly from the sidelines.
He has watched Malcom ease into all the roles earmarked for his hero Neymar: He’s thrived in the centre of the pitch, in a number 10 position, been effective spearheading quick counter-attacks, and operating from either wing. He’s in terrific form, too, his Super Cup brace his fifth and sixth goals in his past four games.
He is a challenge for any marker, his predictable preference to shift on to his left foot compensated by the variety of tricks, with the outside of the boot the instep or the heel, he can conjure with his favoured tool.
“He’s quick, he’s got great balance, and he unsettles defenders,” the former Barcelona star and 1994 Ballon d’Or winner Hristo Stoichkov, says of Malcom. “And he’s always got an eye for goal, with that cannon of a left foot.”
Company profile
Name: Steppi
Founders: Joe Franklin and Milos Savic
Launched: February 2020
Size: 10,000 users by the end of July and a goal of 200,000 users by the end of the year
Employees: Five
Based: Jumeirah Lakes Towers, Dubai
Financing stage: Two seed rounds – the first sourced from angel investors and the founders' personal savings
Second round raised Dh720,000 from silent investors in June this year
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Rain Management
Year started: 2017
Based: Bahrain
Employees: 100-120
Amount raised: $2.5m from BitMex Ventures and Blockwater. Another $6m raised from MEVP, Coinbase, Vision Ventures, CMT, Jimco and DIFC Fintech Fund
Greatest of All Time
Starring: Vijay, Sneha, Prashanth, Prabhu Deva, Mohan
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
The figures behind the event
1) More than 300 in-house cleaning crew
2) 165 staff assigned to sanitise public areas throughout the show
3) 1,000 social distancing stickers
4) 809 hand sanitiser dispensers placed throughout the venue
What is an ETF?
An exchange traded fund is a type of investment fund that can be traded quickly and easily, just like stocks and shares. They come with no upfront costs aside from your brokerage's dealing charges and annual fees, which are far lower than on traditional mutual investment funds. Charges are as low as 0.03 per cent on one of the very cheapest (and most popular), Vanguard S&P 500 ETF, with the maximum around 0.75 per cent.
There is no fund manager deciding which stocks and other assets to invest in, instead they passively track their chosen index, country, region or commodity, regardless of whether it goes up or down.
The first ETF was launched as recently as 1993, but the sector boasted $5.78 billion in assets under management at the end of September as inflows hit record highs, according to the latest figures from ETFGI, a leading independent research and consultancy firm.
There are thousands to choose from, with the five largest providers BlackRock’s iShares, Vanguard, State Street Global Advisers, Deutsche Bank X-trackers and Invesco PowerShares.
While the best-known track major indices such as MSCI World, the S&P 500 and FTSE 100, you can also invest in specific countries or regions, large, medium or small companies, government bonds, gold, crude oil, cocoa, water, carbon, cattle, corn futures, currency shifts or even a stock market crash.
The five types of long-term residential visas
Obed Suhail of ServiceMarket, an online home services marketplace, outlines the five types of long-term residential visas:
Investors:
A 10-year residency visa can be obtained by investors who invest Dh10 million, out of which 60 per cent should not be in real estate. It can be a public investment through a deposit or in a business. Those who invest Dh5 million or more in property are eligible for a five-year residency visa. The invested amount should be completely owned by the investors, not loaned, and retained for at least three years.
Entrepreneurs:
A five-year multiple entry visa is available to entrepreneurs with a previous project worth Dh0.5m or those with the approval of an accredited business incubator in the UAE.
Specialists
Expats with specialised talents, including doctors, specialists, scientists, inventors, and creative individuals working in the field of culture and art are eligible for a 10-year visa, given that they have a valid employment contract in one of these fields in the country.
Outstanding students:
A five-year visa will be granted to outstanding students who have a grade of 95 per cent or higher in a secondary school, or those who graduate with a GPA of 3.75 from a university.
Retirees:
Expats who are at least 55 years old can obtain a five-year retirement visa if they invest Dh2m in property, have savings of Dh1m or more, or have a monthly income of at least Dh20,000.
BIGGEST CYBER SECURITY INCIDENTS IN RECENT TIMES
SolarWinds supply chain attack: Came to light in December 2020 but had taken root for several months, compromising major tech companies, governments and its entities
Microsoft Exchange server exploitation: March 2021; attackers used a vulnerability to steal emails
Kaseya attack: July 2021; ransomware hit perpetrated REvil, resulting in severe downtime for more than 1,000 companies
Log4j breach: December 2021; attackers exploited the Java-written code to inflitrate businesses and governments
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Mountain%20Boy
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Zainab%20Shaheen%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Naser%20Al%20Messabi%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3A%203%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
PRO BASH
Thursday’s fixtures
6pm: Hyderabad Nawabs v Pakhtoon Warriors
10pm: Lahore Sikandars v Pakhtoon Blasters
Teams
Chennai Knights, Lahore Sikandars, Pakhtoon Blasters, Abu Dhabi Stars, Abu Dhabi Dragons, Pakhtoon Warriors and Hyderabad Nawabs.
Squad rules
All teams consist of 15-player squads that include those contracted in the diamond (3), platinum (2) and gold (2) categories, plus eight free to sign team members.
Tournament rules
The matches are of 25 over-a-side with an 8-over power play in which only two fielders allowed outside the 30-yard circle. Teams play in a single round robin league followed by the semi-finals and final. The league toppers will feature in the semi-final eliminator.
Ad Astra
Director: James Gray
Stars: Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones
Five out of five stars
Abu Dhabi GP schedule
Friday: First practice - 1pm; Second practice - 5pm
Saturday: Final practice - 2pm; Qualifying - 5pm
Sunday: Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (55 laps) - 5.10pm
Results
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStage%207%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3E1.%20Adam%20Yates%20(GBR)%20UAE%20Team%20Emirates%20%E2%80%93%203hrs%2029min%2042ses%3Cbr%3E2.%20Remco%20Evenepoel%20(BEL)%20Soudal%20Quick-Step%20%E2%80%93%2010sec%3Cbr%3E3.%20Geoffrey%20Bouchard%20(FRA)%20AG2R%20Citroen%20Team%20%E2%80%93%2042sec%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EGeneral%20Classification%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%3Cbr%3E1.%20Remco%20Evenepoel%20(BEL)%20Soudal%20Quick-Step%3Cbr%3E2.%20Lucas%20Plapp%20(AUS)%20Ineos%20Grenaders%20%E2%80%93%2059se%3Cbr%3E3.%20Adam%20Yates%20(GBR)%20UAE%20Team%20Emirates%20%E2%80%9360sec%3Cbr%3ERed%20Jersey%20(General%20Classification)%3A%20Remco%20Evenepoel%20(BEL)%20Soudal%20Quick-Step%3Cbr%3EGreen%20Jersey%20(Points%20Classification)%3A%20Tim%20Merlier%20(BEL)%20Soudal%20Quick-Step%3Cbr%3EWhite%20Jersey%20(Young%20Rider%20Classification)%3A%20Remco%20Evenepoel%20(BEL)%20Soudal%20Quick-Step%3Cbr%3EBlack%20Jersey%20(Intermediate%20Sprint%20Classification)%3A%20Edward%20Planckaert%20(FRA)%20Alpecin-Deceuninck%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
David Haye record
Total fights: 32
Wins: 28
Wins by KO: 26
Losses: 4
