Liam Rosenior is determined to send 25,000 Hull City fans home revelling in the pleasure of seeing their team take a huge step towards the Europa League group stages.
The Tigers need to beat Slovakian club AS Trencin at the KC Stadium on Thursday to progress to the play-offs after last week’s first leg in Zilina ended as a goalless draw.
Read more: Hull City’s first year in top flight could be a hard act to follow
Thanks chiefly to a reduced price ticket scheme, supporters have reserved every one of the near 25,400 seats available to ensure Trencin face a fiercely partisan reception on Humberside.
And defender Rosenior, who joined Hull when they were struggling to avoid relegation from the Championship back in 2010, is not prepared to disappoint the home faithful.
Asked what Hull need to do to progress, he said: “Win.
“We’re a week further ahead in our pre-season and we’ve done a lot of fitness work this week.
“But it’s a whole different kettle of fish tomorrow, it’s going to be a new experience for us and a new experience for them.
“It will be a full house here and it’s fantastic from the club to lower the prices, especially in the summer holidays so kids can come and see their team play for the first time in Europe.
“We know what a big occasion it is and we’re going to make sure we get the victory that puts us through to the next round.”
The former Fulham and Reading player paid tribute to Tigers manager Steve Bruce, who in only two years has brought Hull into the Premier League, to an FA Cup final and now to the brink of Europe.
“The man sitting next to me has done a fantastic job and when I came to the club we were sitting just outside the Championship relegation zone,” added Rosenior.
“It just goes to show what can be done with know-how, experience and ambition that you can achieve these things.
“But it’s one thing doing well last season and getting to a cup final, but in my experience at Reading, when they finished eighth in their first season, they got the relegated the next year.
“I think players got complacent and took their eye off the ball and were too busy thinking about contracts and not concentrating on the job at hand.
“But with the players we’ve got here and the mentality we’ve got here, I’m sure that won’t happen this season.”
Steve Bruce keeps cards close to chest
Hull manager Steve Bruce kept his counsel over whether summer signings Robert Snodgrass and Tom Ince would make their full debuts in Thursday’s Europa League third-round qualifier against AS Trencin.
The attacking midfielders, recruited from Norwich and Blackpool respectively, ran out for the Tigers for the first time as substitutes towards the end of last week’s goalless first-leg draw in Slovakia.
Bruce has no injury concerns after winger Robbie Brady recovered from tonsillitis, but recently-recruited defenders Andrew Robertson and Harry Maguire are not eligible. Honduran centre-back Maynor Figueroa has been permitted to take an extended holiday following the World Cup.
Hull City provisional squad McGregor, Harper, Jakupovic, Rosenior, Dudgeon, Meyler, Davies, Elmohamady, Chester, McShane, Boyd, Huddlestone, Long, Sagbo, Snodgrass, Quinn, Livermore, Aluko, Brady, Jelavic.
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Joker: Folie a Deux
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Lady Gaga, Brendan Gleeson
Director: Todd Phillips
Rating: 2/5
Company%20Profile
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RACE CARD
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The chef's advice
Troy Payne, head chef at Abu Dhabi’s newest healthy eatery Sanderson’s in Al Seef Resort & Spa, says singles need to change their mindset about how they approach the supermarket.
“They feel like they can’t buy one cucumber,” he says. “But I can walk into a shop – I feed two people at home – and I’ll walk into a shop and I buy one cucumber, I’ll buy one onion.”
Mr Payne asks for the sticker to be placed directly on each item, rather than face the temptation of filling one of the two-kilogram capacity plastic bags on offer.
The chef also advises singletons not get too hung up on “organic”, particularly high-priced varieties that have been flown in from far-flung locales. Local produce is often grown sustainably, and far cheaper, he says.
SPECS
Engine: 4-litre V8 twin-turbo
Power: 630hp
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Singham Again
Director: Rohit Shetty
Stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ranveer Singh, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone
Rating: 3/5
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Qyubic
Started: October 2023
Founder: Namrata Raina
Based: Dubai
Sector: E-commerce
Current number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Initial investment: Undisclosed
Hamilton profile
Age 32
Country United Kingdom
Grands Prix entered 198
Pole positions 67
Wins 57
Podiums 110
Points 2,423
World Championships 3
The Kingfisher Secret
Anonymous, Penguin Books
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Managing the separation process
- Choose your nursery carefully in the first place
- Relax – and hopefully your child will follow suit
- Inform the staff in advance of your child’s likes and dislikes.
- If you need some extra time to talk to the teachers, make an appointment a few days in advance, rather than attempting to chat on your child’s first day
- The longer you stay, the more upset your child will become. As difficult as it is, walk away. Say a proper goodbye and reassure your child that you will be back
- Be patient. Your child might love it one day and hate it the next
- Stick at it. Don’t give up after the first day or week. It takes time for children to settle into a new routine.And, finally, don’t feel guilty.
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.”
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: HyperSpace
Started: 2020
Founders: Alexander Heller, Rama Allen and Desi Gonzalez
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: Entertainment
Number of staff: 210
Investment raised: $75 million from investors including Galaxy Interactive, Riyadh Season, Sega Ventures and Apis Venture Partners