Premier League: Mark Hughes confirmed as new Stoke City manager

Stoke City, the English Premier League club, have confirmed Mark Hughes as their new manager and will formally unveil him on Thursday.

Once Tony Pulis's seven-year stay with the club ended last week, Hughes quickly emerged as the clear favourite to be his successor and after days of talks has now been given the job.

The 49 year old has been out of work since being sacked by Queens Park Rangers last November, with his appointment announced in a brief statement on Thursday morning.

The former Manchester United striker will hold a media conference at 11am.

In choosing Hughes, Stoke have again gone for a Welsh manager, with Hughes having also coached the national side - his first post at the end of a successful playing career.

As an uncompromising striker Hughes played for the likes of Manchester United, Barcelona and Bayern Munich, scoring over 200 goals.

In the dugout, having guided Wales to a World Cup qualifying play-off, he headed back to former club Blackburn where he impressed by earning a European spot.

Manchester City came calling in June 2008 as a result but he was unable to deliver tangible success despite a heavy period of investment and was sacked in December 2009.

Fulham offered him a route back into football in the summer of 2010 and he guided them to eighth in his first season before resigning, citing a desire to better himself.

His next job was at QPR, though, and he took over a side looking to stay in the Premier League at the first attempt. He managed to achieve that after replacing Neil Warnock in January 2012, but was sacked 11 months later after failing to move the side away from the bottom of the table despite healthy backing in the transfer market.

Stoke will be hoping Hughes can carry on the work done by fellow countryman Pulis, who left the Britannia Stadium last week with the best wishes of the club after a successful spell.

He guided them into the Premier League and stabilised them as a top-flight side for four successive seasons. But despite an FA Cup final appearance some fans had grown tired of what they considered a dated style of football and a parting of ways occurred once the season had ended.

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Director: Kangana Ranaut

Stars: Kangana Ranaut, Anupam Kher, Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahima Chaudhry

Rating: 2/5

Haemoglobin disorders explained

Thalassaemia is part of a family of genetic conditions affecting the blood known as haemoglobin disorders.

Haemoglobin is a substance in the red blood cells that carries oxygen and a lack of it triggers anemia, leaving patients very weak, short of breath and pale.

The most severe type of the condition is typically inherited when both parents are carriers. Those patients often require regular blood transfusions - about 450 of the UAE's 2,000 thalassaemia patients - though frequent transfusions can lead to too much iron in the body and heart and liver problems.

The condition mainly affects people of Mediterranean, South Asian, South-East Asian and Middle Eastern origin. Saudi Arabia recorded 45,892 cases of carriers between 2004 and 2014.

A World Health Organisation study estimated that globally there are at least 950,000 'new carrier couples' every year and annually there are 1.33 million at-risk pregnancies.

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T20 World Cup Qualifier fixtures

Tuesday, October 29

Qualifier one, 2.10pm – Netherlands v UAE

Qualifier two, 7.30pm – Namibia v Oman

Wednesday, October 30

Qualifier three, 2.10pm – Scotland v loser of qualifier one

Qualifier four, 7.30pm – Hong Kong v loser of qualifier two

Thursday, October 31

Fifth-place playoff, 2.10pm – winner of qualifier three v winner of qualifier four

Friday, November 1

Semi-final one, 2.10pm – Ireland v winner of qualifier one

Semi-final two, 7.30pm – PNG v winner of qualifier two

Saturday, November 2

Third-place playoff, 2.10pm

Final, 7.30pm

RESULTS

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