It is hard to miss Elias. The World Wrestling Entertainment star looks exactly as you'd expect him to. He strolls up in a snug, rose-patterned shirt with bracelets lining his arms, his hair tied up into a bun, his long, scruffy beard taking attention away from his face. At first glance, it's difficult to know where the line is that divides the man from the character he portrays in the ring. After all, if it weren't for his hulking muscles, Jeffrey Sciullo (his real name) could probably be confused for a rock musician.
Yet despite his looks and talent, WWE passed on the wrestler not once, but four times, before he signed a contract.
The National met Elias in Dubai as part of the WWE 2K20 videogame launch and we were curious to find out how much of his in-ring persona matches who he is out of the ring. "I'm a very sarcastic kind of person," he says, straight off the bat. "I don't go around screaming my catchphrases or anything like that, but, yeah, who you see is very much me. I would say for the most part, the character you see on television is who I am in real life."
Elias, 32, signed with WWE in 2014 after four failed tryouts. Inspired by WWE Hall of Fame wrestlers such as Shawn Michaels, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Bret Hart and the Macho Man Randy Savage, Elias knew early on that he wanted to be a professional wrestler – so he was never going to let a failed tryout stand in his way.
"I made my mind up a long time ago that this is where I wanted to be," he says. "I wanted to be at the top of this, being the main guy. I've still got a way to go but, yes, once I started training independently, I said, 'how do I get to WWE?'."
The path to glory has been tough. He was told "no" at his first paid tryout and another rejection came shortly afterwards. While competing on the independent wrestling circuit, he took part in an untelevised match with Dean Ambrose (who also became a WWE star) and hoped his luck would change. "William Regal [WWE's director of talent development and head of global recruiting] saw me, Pat Patterson [WWE creative consultant] saw me," Elias says. "They said 'we'd like you to come down for a tryout, we'll take care of everything'. So I did that tryout and they still said 'no', so I just went back to the indies and kept on working on it."
While most people would feel discouraged by the rejection, he says he remembered wise words he received from one of his wrestling heroes: Michaels. During the tryout, Michaels told him: "Just remember, a lot of times, 'no' means 'not yet'."
Elias realised he needed to focus on finding the right formula to get noticed. It worked, and soon enough he got a call about a developmental contract to wrestle at NXT, one of WWE's brands.
He has spent the past five years with the company, becoming a household name for wrestling fans. His signature guitar performances, quick wit and in-ring skills have made him a firm fan favourite.
But did he believe he would win over the crowd as much as he has? "Before I went on stage, I had to perform for [WWE chairman] Vince McMahon in his office and there's nothing that's going to be more nerve-racking than Vince sitting right there," Elias says with a laugh. "He had never seen me before, or had at least never seen what I was going to do, so I had to totally introduce it from there. So once you knock that out of the way, going out in front of a crowd is no problem."
Now, while Elias is commended for his athletic prowess, his talent shines brightest when he's performing and riling up an audience. Despite that, he is still left out of the title chase for the WWE Championship. He has the charisma to hold his own through his musical performances, but he says that sometimes he feels he's still being underutilised in the ring. "Performing as much as I did really just gave me so much exposure and I gained a lot of popularity, obviously, and people can relate to or connect to me – whether they hate me or love me – so I wouldn't change any of the performances. But I wish I was put into more matches," he admits.
"I almost think because I performed so much, and it was a hit and fun to watch and see, it was almost like 'hey, we don't need to have him in matches because we know he can do that'. That's fine, but from a personal standpoint, I always want the main match at WrestleMania. I want the title match at Summerslam or whatever it may be."
One thing that's never far from his mind is that wrestling characters can become stagnant and audiences grow bored. He says that if he were "totally in control" creatively, he would continue to develop his rock-star persona. "I've got a lot of ideas as to where to take Elias, so, really, it's about being able to evolve my character," he says.
Regardless of where he stands in the wrestling ranks and how hard he's had to work to get here, he's still certain he made the right choice. "My whole life was to be here doing this," he says.
No doubt, his ever-growing fan base would agree.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Hurricanes 31-31 Lions
Wellington Hurricanes:
Tries: Gibbins, Laumape, Goosen, Fifita tries, Barrett
Conversions: Barrett (4)
Penalties: Barrett
British & Irish Lions:
Tries: Seymour (2), North
Conversions: Biggar (2)
Penalties: Biggar (4)
Company profile
Date started: December 24, 2018
Founders: Omer Gurel, chief executive and co-founder and Edebali Sener, co-founder and chief technology officer
Based: Dubai Media City
Number of employees: 42 (34 in Dubai and a tech team of eight in Ankara, Turkey)
Sector: ConsumerTech and FinTech
Cashflow: Almost $1 million a year
Funding: Series A funding of $2.5m with Series B plans for May 2020
Bib%20Gourmand%20restaurants
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It Was Just an Accident
Director: Jafar Panahi
Stars: Vahid Mobasseri, Mariam Afshari, Ebrahim Azizi, Hadis Pakbaten, Majid Panahi, Mohamad Ali Elyasmehr
Rating: 4/5
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
David Haye record
Total fights: 32
Wins: 28
Wins by KO: 26
Losses: 4
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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
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
Day 5, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance
Moment of the day When Dilruwan Perera dismissed Yasir Shah to end Pakistan’s limp resistance, the Sri Lankans charged around the field with the fevered delirium of a side not used to winning. Trouble was, they had not. The delivery was deemed a no ball. Sri Lanka had a nervy wait, but it was merely a stay of execution for the beleaguered hosts.
Stat of the day – 5 Pakistan have lost all 10 wickets on the fifth day of a Test five times since the start of 2016. It is an alarming departure for a side who had apparently erased regular collapses from their resume. “The only thing I can say, it’s not a mitigating excuse at all, but that’s a young batting line up, obviously trying to find their way,” said Mickey Arthur, Pakistan’s coach.
The verdict Test matches in the UAE are known for speeding up on the last two days, but this was extreme. The first two innings of this Test took 11 sessions to complete. The remaining two were done in less than four. The nature of Pakistan’s capitulation at the end showed just how difficult the transition is going to be in the post Misbah-ul-Haq era.