Training between mounds of snow without Neymar, Brazil may be forgiven for feeling out of their element as they prepare to face hosts Russia in their penultimate World Cup warm-up.
The most expensive football player on the planet is back home, celebrating his sister's birthday with his famous right foot recovering from surgery in a protective boot.
But things are serious in Moscow, where the Selecao play on Friday at the Luzhniki Stadium in which they will hope to lift a record sixth World Cup trophy on July 15.
Manager Tite will try to make sure his superstars have learned from the unmitigated disaster of their 7-1 drubbing by Germany, whom Brazil play on Tuesday, on home soil back in 2014.
That fateful World Cup semi-final four years ago was played without the injured Neymar or suspended centre-back Thiago Silva.
Now, as then, Brazil are looking vulnerable in defence and missing their 26-year-old hero.
Paris Saint-Germain forward Neymar "is a different player. He is one of the top three in the world," Tite said. "But a strong team should not depend on specific names."
Without Neymar, Tite is entrusting the left wing to Juventus's in-form Douglas Costa. The 27-year-old player is in the prime of his career after spending much of it tucked away in Ukraine playing for Shakhtar Donetsk.
Costa has only found the net three times in 22 appearances in a yellow jersey but this is his time to shine, and he does not seem phased by the occasion.
"Replacing Neymar is an enormous challenge, but we have a lot of class acts on the team who have big potential," Costa said. "Neymar's absence gives the other players a chance to show themselves, to show their best side."
Costa will be paired up front with Chelsea's graceful winger Willian and Gabriel Jesus, who has scored 11 times for Manchester City this season.
It is a dizzying array of stars and Real Madrid midfielder Casemiro may have put it most succinctly when contemplating the effect of such strong internal competition.
"I do not want to lose my place to anyone," Casemiro said. "I want to play for my country, play in all the matches, and I am ready to show my best at training to do it."
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If Tite is spending any sleepless nights, it might not be because of Neymar's absence but due to his defence.
Despite boasting a trio of Neymar's PSG teammates: Silva, Marquinhos and Dani Alves, Brazil have a weakness at left-back should something happen to Real Madrid's Marcelo.
His regular replacement Filipe Luis suffered a broken leg playing for Atletico Madrid last week and is expected to be out for two months.
Third choice Alex Sandro of Italian champions Juventus was injured during the first training session in Moscow.
As a result, Tite had to call up the uncapped 28-year-old Ismaily - named after an obscure 1956 British film called "Smiley".
He is a complete unknown in his homeland and his selection was perhaps more due to his geographic proximity - he plays for Shakhtar Donetsk in Ukraine - than anything else.
Rio's Globo Esporte newspaper pointed out incredulously that Ismaily was the 10th left-back called up by Tite since he took over in 2014.
Despite the problems, and temperatures due to drop to -9 Celsius (16 Fahrenheit) in Moscow, Brazil are hoping to leave a legacy.
"We will be playing in the stadium that will host the final, and we want to leave a wish," Casemiro said. "We want to come back here in the summer and try to win the title."
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
The Birkin bag is made by Hermès.
It is named after actress and singer Jane Birkin
Noone from Hermès will go on record to say how much a new Birkin costs, how long one would have to wait to get one, and how many bags are actually made each year.
Brief scores:
Day 2
England: 277 & 19-0
West Indies: 154
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
U19 WORLD CUP, WEST INDIES
UAE group fixtures (all in St Kitts)
- Saturday 15 January: UAE beat Canada by 49 runs
- Thursday 20 January: v England
- Saturday 22 January: v Bangladesh
UAE squad:
Alishan Sharafu (captain), Shival Bawa, Jash Giyanani, Sailles
Jaishankar, Nilansh Keswani, Aayan Khan, Punya Mehra, Ali Naseer, Ronak Panoly,
Dhruv Parashar, Vinayak Raghavan, Soorya Sathish, Aryansh Sharma, Adithya
Shetty, Kai Smith
ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldana, Brad Garrett
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Rating: 4/5
Wicked: For Good
Director: Jon M Chu
Starring: Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Jonathan Bailey, Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Yeoh, Ethan Slater
Rating: 4/5
Third Test
Day 3, stumps
India 443-7 (d) & 54-5 (27 ov)
Australia 151
India lead by 346 runs with 5 wickets remaining
More from Rashmee Roshan Lall
Despacito's dominance in numbers
Released: 2017
Peak chart position: No.1 in more than 47 countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Lebanon
Views: 5.3 billion on YouTube
Sales: With 10 million downloads in the US, Despacito became the first Latin single to receive Diamond sales certification
Streams: 1.3 billion combined audio and video by the end of 2017, making it the biggest digital hit of the year.
Awards: 17, including Record of the Year at last year’s prestigious Latin Grammy Awards, as well as five Billboard Music Awards
A list of the animal rescue organisations in the UAE
Brief scores:
Liverpool 3
Mane 24', Shaqiri 73', 80'
Manchester United 1
Lingard 33'
Man of the Match: Fabinho (Liverpool)
England v South Africa schedule:
- First Test: At Lord's, England won by 219 runs
- Second Test: July 14-18, Trent Bridge, Nottingham, 2pm
- Third Test: The Oval, London, July 27-31, 2pm
- Fourth Test: Old Trafford, Manchester, August 4-8
SERIE A FIXTURES
Friday Sassuolo v Torino (Kick-off 10.45pm UAE)
Saturday Atalanta v Sampdoria (5pm),
Genoa v Inter Milan (8pm),
Lazio v Bologna (10.45pm)
Sunday Cagliari v Crotone (3.30pm)
Benevento v Napoli (6pm)
Parma v Spezia (6pm)
Fiorentina v Udinese (9pm)
Juventus v Hellas Verona (11.45pm)
Monday AC Milan v AS Roma (11.45pm)
UAE jiu-jitsu squad
Men: Hamad Nawad and Khalid Al Balushi (56kg), Omar Al Fadhli and Saeed Al Mazroui (62kg), Taleb Al Kirbi and Humaid Al Kaabi (69kg), Mohammed Al Qubaisi and Saud Al Hammadi (70kg), Khalfan Belhol and Mohammad Haitham Radhi (85kg), Faisal Al Ketbi and Zayed Al Kaabi (94kg)
Women: Wadima Al Yafei and Mahra Al Hanaei (49kg), Bashayer Al Matrooshi and Hessa Al Shamsi (62kg)
The%C2%A0specs%20
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The specs
Engine: 6.2-litre supercharged V8
Power: 712hp at 6,100rpm
Torque: 881Nm at 4,800rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 19.6 l/100km
Price: Dh380,000
On sale: now
How to watch Ireland v Pakistan in UAE
When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11
What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time.
TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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