DUBAI // Club officials at Al Wasl say doctors are still working to pinpoint the exact nature of the illness which has forced Bruno Metsu to temporarily halt his duties as manager.
Metsu, who took over from Diego Maradona as manager of the club this summer, missed the fixture against Al Jazira on Monday as he continued medical examinations at the American Hospital Dubai.
The 58 year old coach, who had been suffering from abdominal pain, is not under 24 hour hospital supervision but has been told to stay away from his daily duties. He has spent one full night at hospital, but has been able to spend most of this week at his home in Dubai.
The Frenchman’s assistant coaches Gilles Morisseau and Nasser Khamis have been placed in charge of first team affairs until further notice.
Despite his absence from the Zabeel Stadium, the stricken manager has still been able to regularly convey instructions to his team, according to Morisseau, Metsu’s deputy.
"The coach is resting now, because he has been told to at this current time," said the caretaker coach, who will be at the helm for this weekend’s trip to Ajman.
"We definitely hope he comes back soon. Although he is away from the team, he is in close contact with the coaching staff.
"The club have requested privacy for their absent manager, as they await a conclusive diagnosis of his condition.
"It hasn’t been accurately pinpointed and the final outcome has not been reached,” said Tariq Al Sharabi, a spokesman for Al Wasl.
"The coach is tired and he is not in a position, as per doctors’ advice, to go about his day to day work normally.
"He cannot come to training sessions, he cannot sit on the bench and he has been asked to come to hospital at various times this week.
"The only thing we can say now is that there are tests being done thoroughly to pinpoint the cause. Even if the cause was found, this is a private matter.
"This is private and we ask the media and fans to respect that privacy and not to speculate.
"It does not help to spread rumours which might have a bad effect on the coach’s family, the coach himself, on the players and on the fans."
Metsu is a highly popular figure in the region - and in the UAE in particular, having guided the national team to the Gulf Cup of Nations title on home soil in 2007.
He was also in charge at Al Ain when the club became the first and so far only UAE club to with the Asian Champions League in 2003.
Wasl have invested great hope in him restoring the club’s position among the country’s elite following the aborted reign of Maradona.
His deputy hopes the illness-enforced absence will not have a detrimental effect on the good work they have done so far this season, and hopes to have him back on the sidelines as soon as possible.
"There is daily contact between us," Morisseau said. "We really hope this won’t effect the team.
"I hope they can give the same level of performance they have since the start of the league.
"It is not my place to talk about his condition, we just hope he gets better and better every day."
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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.”
