Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino praised his club for snatching a point at the Emirates Stadium against Arsenal in the Premier League on Saturday.
Pochettino was keen to heap praise on his players in his first north London derby rather than engage in a war of words with Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger, who accused Tottenham of wasting time at the end of the match.
“It is a good point,” he said. “Arsenal managed the ball and the territory and possession but we were compact in our defensive line and we were able to get the ball forward quickly to surprise Arsenal.
“Today we competed on the pitch. We have been in charge for three months and we have travelled far. We needed to compete with one of the best teams in the world. We are starting to deliver our philosophy.”
Tottenham are also in European action in the next few days, hosting Besiktas in the Europa League on Thursday before taking on Southampton, the club former Argentina defender Pochettino left in pre-season to take over at White Hart Lane.
Wenger, meanwhile, expressed his displeasure with Tottenham’s pace of play near the end, as defender Danny Rose was shown a yellow card for taking too long to resume play following a free-kick award.
“They took every second they could again, to make the game last as little as possible,” an exasperated Wenger said. “I would like to see the referee deal with that in the proper way for once.”
Worse for Wenger, his Arsenal side are now in the middle of an injury crisis ahead of their Champions League group game with Galatasaray and the meeting with Premier League leaders Chelsea that follows soon after.
On Saturday, the Frenchman saw his club come back from a goal scored against the run of play by Nacer Chadli to share a 1-1 draw at home to Tottenham Hotspur in the north London derby, with Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain firing in Arsenal’s equaliser.
But that point came at a cost as both Mikel Arteta and Aaron Ramsey were forced off before half-time with injuries and will play no part in either of the next two fixtures. Arteta sustained a calf injury, while Ramsey suffered a hamstring problem.
That has limited Arsenal manager Wenger’s choices in midfield, especially as Jack Wilshere was also hurt in the derby, suffering an ankle injury.
The England international was substituted just after the hour mark and is a doubt for the Galatasaray game at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday.
“There is no chance,” Wenger said when asked about Arteta and Ramsey’s prospects of being involved in Sunday’s trip to Chelsea, who are currently six points ahead of his team.
“If it is a muscular problem I don’t see how they can be fit in five or six days time,” he added.
“I don’t know how long they’ll be out but they will be out until next week. Suddenly we are short because if we lost three players today and let’s not forgot that we already have two out long-term (Olivier Giroud and Mathieu Debuchy) plus (Theo) Walcott, that’s six. (Abou) Diaby is not ready so it starts to become a worry.”
Ramsey and Wilshere have both been troubled by injuries in the past but Wenger insisted he was at a loss to explain the latest setbacks.
“Wilshere, if you look at the incident again, has been tackled and turned his ankle over,” he said.
“Ramsey is a concern that he did his hamstring. I don’t understand because he had a good rest this week, I didn’t play him (in the League Cup) against Southampton on Tuesday night. It’s a surprise because he’s usually a resistant boy.”
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
The White Lotus: Season three
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Padmaavat
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The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Pearls on a Branch: Oral Tales
Najlaa Khoury, Archipelago Books
