Raul, right, stands beside new teammate Christoph Metzelder at his first training session in Gelsenkirchen yesterday.
Raul, right, stands beside new teammate Christoph Metzelder at his first training session in Gelsenkirchen yesterday.

Record-breaking Raul swaps Real Madrid for Schalke



Raul, Real Madrid's talismanic striker who left the Bernabeu after 16 record-breaking seasons, has signed for Schalke at the age of 33. Raul, who scored 323 times in 741 games for Real, notched 66 Champions League goals and is Spain's all-time leading scorer with 44 goals, will try to revive his career in the Bundesliga in the industrial city of Gelsenkirchen after falling out of favour at the club where he made his name.

"I'm looking forward to starting on a new challenge," said Raul, who will wear the No 7 shirt at Schalke. "It's an important challenge for me." "I'm glad that we succeeded in enthusing such an exceptional footballer and world-class goalscorer about a move to the Bundesliga and to Schalke," Felix Magath, the Schalke coach,said. "His signing is a decisive step in our efforts to strengthen and restructure the squad."

Schalke had a gap to fill in their attack after Kevin Kuranyi left for Dynamo Moscow at the end of last season. Kuranyi's 18 goals helped the club to a second-place finish in the Bundesliga behind Bayern Munich, qualifying it for Champions League play. Raul is Schalke's second signing from Real Madrid in the offseason, joining Christoph Metzelder, the former Germany defender, who spent three injury-plagued seasons at Madrid and saw little playing time.

* AP

Venue: Sharjah Cricket Stadium

Date: Sunday, November 25

The rules of the road keeping cyclists safe

Cyclists must wear a helmet, arm and knee pads

Have a white front-light and a back red-light on their bike

They must place a number plate with reflective light to the back of the bike to alert road-users

Avoid carrying weights that could cause the bike to lose balance

They must cycle on designated lanes and areas and ride safe on pavements to avoid bumping into pedestrians

MATCH INFO

What: Brazil v South Korea
When: Tonight, 5.30pm
Where: Mohamed bin Zayed Stadium, Abu Dhabi
Tickets: www.ticketmaster.ae

How Voiss turns words to speech

The device has a screen reader or software that monitors what happens on the screen

The screen reader sends the text to the speech synthesiser

This converts to audio whatever it receives from screen reader, so the person can hear what is happening on the screen

A VOISS computer costs between $200 and $250 depending on memory card capacity that ranges from 32GB to 128GB

The speech synthesisers VOISS develops are free

Subsequent computer versions will include improvements such as wireless keyboards

Arabic voice in affordable talking computer to be added next year to English, Portuguese, and Spanish synthesiser

Partnerships planned during Expo 2020 Dubai to add more languages

At least 2.2 billion people globally have a vision impairment or blindness

More than 90 per cent live in developing countries

The Long-term aim of VOISS to reach the technology to people in poor countries with workshops that teach them to build their own device

Jebel Ali Dragons 26 Bahrain 23

Dragons
Tries: Hayes, Richards, Cooper
Cons: Love
Pens: Love 3

Bahrain
Tries: Kenny, Crombie, Tantoh
Cons: Phillips
Pens: Phillips 2

EMILY IN PARIS: SEASON 3

Created by: Darren Star

Starring: Lily Collins, Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu, Ashley Park

Rating: 2.75/5

Company profile

Company name: Fasset
Started: 2019
Founders: Mohammad Raafi Hossain, Daniel Ahmed
Based: Dubai
Sector: FinTech
Initial investment: $2.45 million
Current number of staff: 86
Investment stage: Pre-series B
Investors: Investcorp, Liberty City Ventures, Fatima Gobi Ventures, Primal Capital, Wealthwell Ventures, FHS Capital, VN2 Capital, local family offices

SPECS

Engine: 1.5-litre turbo

Power: 181hp

Torque: 230Nm

Transmission: 6-speed automatic

Starting price: Dh79,000

On sale: Now

Start-up hopes to end Japan's love affair with cash

Across most of Asia, people pay for taxi rides, restaurant meals and merchandise with smartphone-readable barcodes — except in Japan, where cash still rules. Now, as the country’s biggest web companies race to dominate the payments market, one Tokyo-based startup says it has a fighting chance to win with its QR app.

Origami had a head start when it introduced a QR-code payment service in late 2015 and has since signed up fast-food chain KFC, Tokyo’s largest cab company Nihon Kotsu and convenience store operator Lawson. The company raised $66 million in September to expand nationwide and plans to more than double its staff of about 100 employees, says founder Yoshiki Yasui.

Origami is betting that stores, which until now relied on direct mail and email newsletters, will pay for the ability to reach customers on their smartphones. For example, a hair salon using Origami’s payment app would be able to send a message to past customers with a coupon for their next haircut.

Quick Response codes, the dotted squares that can be read by smartphone cameras, were invented in the 1990s by a unit of Toyota Motor to track automotive parts. But when the Japanese pioneered digital payments almost two decades ago with contactless cards for train fares, they chose the so-called near-field communications technology. The high cost of rolling out NFC payments, convenient ATMs and a culture where lost wallets are often returned have all been cited as reasons why cash remains king in the archipelago. In China, however, QR codes dominate.

Cashless payments, which includes credit cards, accounted for just 20 per cent of total consumer spending in Japan during 2016, compared with 60 per cent in China and 89 per cent in South Korea, according to a report by the Bank of Japan.


Abtal

Keep up with all the Middle East and North Africa athletes at the 2024 Paris Olympics

      By signing up, I agree to The National's privacy policy
      Abtal