Jeremy Manning, right, of the Abu Dhabi Harlequins is in another final against the Dubai Hurricanes on Friday. Jeff Topping / The National
Jeremy Manning, right, of the Abu Dhabi Harlequins is in another final against the Dubai Hurricanes on Friday. Jeff Topping / The National

Take it from Jeremy Manning: UAE Premiership final is a big game



DUBAI // When a former professional who has played in some of the biggest arenas in rugby says the UAE Premiership final is “as big as it gets” here, it could mean one of two things.

Either he is over it already and would prefer to be somewhere else, or that he is just as amped about playing as he has been for any other fixture that has gone before.

Happily for Abu Dhabi Harlequins, Jeremy Manning’s sentiments regarding tonight’s grand final against Dubai Hurricanes are definitely the latter.

The Quins player-coach has been there, done that, got the Youtube video.

In a previous posting, he was part of Munster’s victorious squad for the 2006 Heineken Cup final, a game watched by 75,000 people in Cardiff. The New Zealander also has faced down the haka, the Maori war dance, when playing for Munster against the All Blacks in 2008.

Yet he still anticipates having “butterflies in my stomach” before running out against the Hurricanes at The Sevens on Friday night.

“From my personal point of view, yes, I’ve been lucky enough to play in a few pretty big, awesome games, but I feel the same way about every game,” Manning said.

“It doesn’t matter if it is against the Dragons or the Hurricanes in the final, or a pre-season game, I approach it the same. I am looking forward to it.”

It says how much this game means to Manning, whose club have lost five major finals in two seasons, that he was even angry at times this week.

The affable playmaker rarely seems upset by anything, but he termed UAE rugby's decision to prevent Adel Al Hendi playing for Quins in the final "ridiculous".

Clearly the passion still runs deep for him, even if the stakes are lower than at times in the past.

“I think the day that you don’t get nervous is the day you should hang up your boots,” he said.

“I still get butterflies in my stomach no matter what game it is, whether it be a pre-season game, a sevens game or the UAE Premiership final. The day you don’t get that is the day you should stop.”

Both sides have demons to exorcise tonight.

Harlequins may have lost five of the six major finals to Dragons during the past two seasons, but it was Hurricanes who were beaten in this corresponding fixture last year.

The severity of the defeat back then, at Jebel Ali’s Centre of Excellence, seemed to have a detrimental effect for the rest of the campaign. Hurricanes were nothing like as competitive in the Gulf Top Six that followed.

However, Daniel Perry, the new Hurricanes’ captain, believes his in-form side are capable of settling that score tonight.

“Our goal was always to get to the final, and now we are in it, to win the final,” Perry said.

“We are there now and it is going to be hard. We beat Quins by just a point” in the regular league season “and were let off when they missed a last minute.

“We have a brilliant set of backs. Our forwards can do the dirty work, but when our backs throw the ball around we’d back them to score every single time.”

UAE sevens also in action at tournament in Al Ain

Roelof Kotze, the UAE performance manager, hopes the local community will come to Al Ain Amblers rugby club this weekend to support the national sevens team.

The UAE are playing in a competition for developing Asian rugby nations, which represents the bottom rung of the qualification process for the Olympics, in the Garden City.

The national team need to succeed in this tournament to remain as one of the core sides in the Asian Sevens Series next year.

The all-Emirati home side will likely face tough competition from the likes of Lebanon and Jordan in Al Ain, and Kotze says his players could do with some backing.

“We hope to get some local support,” he said. “It’s not often that we as a sevens side get the chance to play locally, and it will be good for rugby here. Al Ain is one of the better venues for rugby in this country, it is not that hot, and it would be good to get some support for our side.”

pradley@thenational.ae

Follow our sports coverage on twitter at @SprtNationalUAE

The specs

Engine: Dual 180kW and 300kW front and rear motors

Power: 480kW

Torque: 850Nm

Transmission: Single-speed automatic

Price: From Dh359,900 ($98,000)

On sale: Now

From Zero

Artist: Linkin Park

Label: Warner Records

Number of tracks: 11

Rating: 4/5

The specs
 
Engine: 3.0-litre six-cylinder turbo
Power: 398hp from 5,250rpm
Torque: 580Nm at 1,900-4,800rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed auto
Fuel economy, combined: 6.5L/100km
On sale: December
Price: From Dh330,000 (estimate)
Company%20profile%20
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EYodawy%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Egypt%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounders%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EKarim%20Khashaba%2C%20Sherief%20El-Feky%20and%20Yasser%20AbdelGawad%3Cstrong%3E%3Cbr%3ESector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EHealthTech%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETotal%20funding%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E%2424.5%20million%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAlgebra%20Ventures%2C%20Global%20Ventures%2C%20MEVP%20and%20Delivery%20Hero%20Ventures%2C%20among%20others%3Cstrong%3E%3Cbr%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20500%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Wicked
Director: Jon M Chu
Stars: Cynthia Erivo, Ariana Grande, Jonathan Bailey
Rating: 4/5
Singham Again

Director: Rohit Shetty

Stars: Ajay Devgn, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ranveer Singh, Akshay Kumar, Tiger Shroff, Deepika Padukone

Rating: 3/5

Cricket World Cup League 2

UAE squad

Rahul Chopra (captain), Aayan Afzal Khan, Ali Naseer, Aryansh Sharma, Basil Hameed, Dhruv Parashar, Junaid Siddique, Muhammad Farooq, Muhammad Jawadullah, Muhammad Waseem, Omid Rahman, Rahul Bhatia, Tanish Suri, Vishnu Sukumaran, Vriitya Aravind

Fixtures

Friday, November 1 – Oman v UAE
Sunday, November 3 – UAE v Netherlands
Thursday, November 7 – UAE v Oman
Saturday, November 9 – Netherlands v UAE

Revival
Eminem
Interscope

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding
The more serious side of specialty coffee

While the taste of beans and freshness of roast is paramount to the specialty coffee scene, so is sustainability and workers’ rights.

The bulk of genuine specialty coffee companies aim to improve on these elements in every stage of production via direct relationships with farmers. For instance, Mokha 1450 on Al Wasl Road strives to work predominantly with women-owned and -operated coffee organisations, including female farmers in the Sabree mountains of Yemen.

Because, as the boutique’s owner, Garfield Kerr, points out: “women represent over 90 per cent of the coffee value chain, but are woefully underrepresented in less than 10 per cent of ownership and management throughout the global coffee industry.”

One of the UAE’s largest suppliers of green (meaning not-yet-roasted) beans, Raw Coffee, is a founding member of the Partnership of Gender Equity, which aims to empower female coffee farmers and harvesters.

Also, globally, many companies have found the perfect way to recycle old coffee grounds: they create the perfect fertile soil in which to grow mushrooms. 

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 

Disclaimer

Director: Alfonso Cuaron 

Stars: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Kline, Lesley Manville 

Rating: 4/5

The%20Witcher%20-%20season%20three
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EVarious%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3E%0D%3Cbr%3EStars%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EHenry%20Cavill%2C%20Freya%20Allan%2C%20Anya%20Chalotra%3Cstrong%3E%0D%3Cbr%3E%0D%3Cbr%3ERating%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%203%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
The specs

Engine: Direct injection 4-cylinder 1.4-litre
Power: 150hp
Torque: 250Nm
Price: From Dh139,000
On sale: Now


Middle East Today

The must read newsletter for the region

      By signing up, I agree to The National's privacy policy
      Middle East Today