The world's glitziest, most lucrative cricket league will launch its seventh season in the capital next month. The Indian Premier League (IPL) will kick off at the Sheikh Zayed stadium in Abu Dhabi on April 16 with a match between the defending champions Mumbai Indians and Kolkatta Knight Riders.
That, the IPL announced after a meeting in Chennai on Wednesday, will be the first of 20 matches – a third of the entire season – in the UAE. The league will run in the country until April 30 and the matches will be played across Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah.
Click here for the full schedule of IPL 7 matches in the UAE
Five of the 15 playing days during which the IPL will make the UAE its home will feature double-headers, with most pegged for weekends. The early games on those days will start at 2.30pm (UAE time) and the evening matches at 6.30pm. On the other 10 days, single games will be played at 6.30pm.
The 20 games have been distributed fairly evenly across the three major venues in the country. Dubai’s Sports City stadium will host seven games; Sheikh Zayed stadium in the capital will also host seven while Sharjah will see the remaining six games.
Abu Dhabi and Dubai will have two double-header days while Sharjah will have one.
Ticket prices for the games are expected to begin at Dh25, with the aim, organisers said, of creating the energy of a full house at every match, in part for the benefit of television viewers, a number which could approach three billion, putting it in the same range as the 2010 Fifa World Cup.
The approximately 300,000 tickets for the 20 matches will go on sale no later than next week. According to the schedule all eight IPL franchises will play at least once in each of the three designated UAE host cities.
A launch event is also expected to be held in Abu Dhabi on April 15, the night before the season begins.
The IPL has moved out of India for the second time in its short existence. As with the first time, when it was played in entirety in South Africa in 2009, upcoming general elections in India are the cause. Those are to be held over nine phases, beginning on April 7 and running right through to May 12.
As they did in 2009, the dates clash has meant that states will not be able to provide enough security staff for matches as they will be needed to oversee polling.
At one stage, this season potentially could have been played in three countries. After the UAE leg, the league could have moved to Bangladesh. But that possibility lessened on Wednesday, after the BCCI released a statement believing the IPL could shift back to India in early May.
“Many State Governments have indicated that IPL matches can be conducted in their respective states,” the statement said. “Based on the responses received so far, the BCCI believes that the Pepsi IPL 2014 can be conducted in India from the first week of May.
“The schedule for the remaining 40 matches will be announced in due course.” The league ends on June 1.
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Ticket prices
- Golden circle - Dh995
- Floor Standing - Dh495
- Lower Bowl Platinum - Dh95
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The Year Earth Changed
Directed by:Tom Beard
Narrated by: Sir David Attenborough
Stars: 4
RESULT
Fifth ODI, at Headingley
England 351/9
Pakistan 297
England win by 54 runs (win series 4-0)
TO A LAND UNKNOWN
Director: Mahdi Fleifel
Starring: Mahmoud Bakri, Aram Sabbah, Mohammad Alsurafa
Rating: 4.5/5
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SPEC SHEET
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The Facility’s Versatility
Between the start of the 2020 IPL on September 20, and the end of the Pakistan Super League this coming Thursday, the Zayed Cricket Stadium has had an unprecedented amount of traffic.
Never before has a ground in this country – or perhaps anywhere in the world – had such a volume of major-match cricket.
And yet scoring has remained high, and Abu Dhabi has seen some classic encounters in every format of the game.
October 18, IPL, Kolkata Knight Riders tied with Sunrisers Hyderabad
The two playoff-chasing sides put on 163 apiece, before Kolkata went on to win the Super Over
January 8, ODI, UAE beat Ireland by six wickets
A century by CP Rizwan underpinned one of UAE’s greatest ever wins, as they chased 270 to win with an over to spare
February 6, T10, Northern Warriors beat Delhi Bulls by eight wickets
The final of the T10 was chiefly memorable for a ferocious over of fast bowling from Fidel Edwards to Nicholas Pooran
March 14, Test, Afghanistan beat Zimbabwe by six wickets
Eleven wickets for Rashid Khan, 1,305 runs scored in five days, and a last session finish
June 17, PSL, Islamabad United beat Peshawar Zalmi by 15 runs
Usman Khawaja scored a hundred as Islamabad posted the highest score ever by a Pakistan team in T20 cricket
Business Insights
- As per the document, there are six filing options, including choosing to report on a realisation basis and transitional rules for pre-tax period gains or losses.
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Graphene is extracted from graphite and is made up of pure carbon.
It is 200 times more resistant than steel and five times lighter than aluminum.
It conducts electricity better than any other material at room temperature.
It is thought that graphene could boost the useful life of batteries by 10 per cent.
Graphene can also detect cancer cells in the early stages of the disease.
The material was first discovered when Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov were 'playing' with graphite at the University of Manchester in 2004.
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Mina Al-Oraibi: Iraq is in a fight to show its people who is really in charge
Khaled Yacoub Oweis: Iraq PM goes from shy writer to the political peak
The National Editorial: Iran's 'failed model' should be discontinued
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Disclaimer
Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Stars: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Kline, Lesley Manville
Rating: 4/5
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
Business Insights
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The biog:
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From Zero
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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
What drives subscription retailing?
Once the domain of newspaper home deliveries, subscription model retailing has combined with e-commerce to permeate myriad products and services.
The concept has grown tremendously around the world and is forecast to thrive further, according to UnivDatos Market Insights’ report on recent and predicted trends in the sector.
The global subscription e-commerce market was valued at $13.2 billion (Dh48.5bn) in 2018. It is forecast to touch $478.2bn in 2025, and include the entertainment, fitness, food, cosmetics, baby care and fashion sectors.
The report says subscription-based services currently constitute “a small trend within e-commerce”. The US hosts almost 70 per cent of recurring plan firms, including leaders Dollar Shave Club, Hello Fresh and Netflix. Walmart and Sephora are among longer established retailers entering the space.
UnivDatos cites younger and affluent urbanites as prime subscription targets, with women currently the largest share of end-users.
That’s expected to remain unchanged until 2025, when women will represent a $246.6bn market share, owing to increasing numbers of start-ups targeting women.
Personal care and beauty occupy the largest chunk of the worldwide subscription e-commerce market, with changing lifestyles, work schedules, customisation and convenience among the chief future drivers.
COMPANY PROFILE
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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.”
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Sreesanth's India bowling career
Tests 27, Wickets 87, Average 37.59, Best 5-40
ODIs 53, Wickets 75, Average 33.44, Best 6-55
T20Is 10, Wickets 7, Average 41.14, Best 2-12
What is a black hole?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed