Middlesbrough's Stewart Downing shown during his team's Championship match against Ipswich Town earlier this month. Stephen Pond / Getty Images / December 4, 2015
Middlesbrough's Stewart Downing shown during his team's Championship match against Ipswich Town earlier this month. Stephen Pond / Getty Images / December 4, 2015

Nice to ‘see us at the top’ for Middlesbrough’s Aitor Karanka



Aitor Karanka says he wants his Middlesbrough side to be a top-of-the-table club at the end of the season – and not just for Christmas.

The team leapfrogged Brighton & Hove Albion at the Championship summit on goal difference after a scrappy win at home to Burnley.

“It’s nice to look at the table and see us at the top,” admitted the Boro manager.

Read more: It may be time to finally conclude error-prone Louis van Gaal isn't the right man for Man United, writes Richard Jolly

“It means we’re doing a good job. But we need to be there at the end of the season and we have to look at the next game.

“I’m very pleased. Our performance maybe wasn’t the best and not the nicest to watch.

“I had a tough job to do, to pick the first XI, but the players who played did really well in terms of their attitude

“I told them before the game we need a lot of games and all of them have to be ready, and that was a really good example of that for me.”

Karanka has been keen to stress the importance of his squad, and the Spaniard made four changes after Saturday’s 0-0 draw against Birmingham City.

“When I speak about the club and the team I speak about all of the players,” he added.

“It took me three days to decide the team. I asked my staff about who to play in the first XI, and all of them gave me four different team sheets. Mine was different. We have good players who can do very well.

“It’s difficult because we have to manage the players and make sure they’re all motivated.”

Burnley manager Sean Dyche was pleased with his side’s display despite seeing their winless run stretch to six games.

He said: “The margins are tight, we could have come away with a clean sheet and a point.

“Credit to Boro, they’ve done well at winning tight games this season.

“They like to keep the ball here and move it around the back. We had to find a way of affecting that and I thought we did for a lot of the game.

“But we looked hungrier to get something from the game and they started to stand off a bit and go deeper.”

Dyche is confident his side can get back into form after slipping to fifth in the table.

“We’ve won nine out of 12 before this, so we know how to win games, it has deserted us for the moment,” he added.

“A couple of things have gone against us, but we also have to take care of our own business.

“There are a lot of runners and riders this season but we think we’re among that.

“We need to push forward. We think we’re close, but the margins are so fine at the top end of this division.

“Tonight we played with calmness and assuredness, but we just let ourselves down in the final third.”

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Director: Kangana Ranaut

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

Rating: 2/5

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Rating: 2/5

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Five famous companies founded by teens

There are numerous success stories of teen businesses that were created in college dorm rooms and other modest circumstances. Below are some of the most recognisable names in the industry:

  1. Facebook: Mark Zuckerberg and his friends started Facebook when he was a 19-year-old Harvard undergraduate. 
  2. Dell: When Michael Dell was an undergraduate student at Texas University in 1984, he started upgrading computers for profit. He starting working full-time on his business when he was 19. Eventually, his company became the Dell Computer Corporation and then Dell Inc. 
  3. Subway: Fred DeLuca opened the first Subway restaurant when he was 17. In 1965, Mr DeLuca needed extra money for college, so he decided to open his own business. Peter Buck, a family friend, lent him $1,000 and together, they opened Pete’s Super Submarines. A few years later, the company was rebranded and called Subway. 
  4. Mashable: In 2005, Pete Cashmore created Mashable in Scotland when he was a teenager. The site was then a technology blog. Over the next few decades, Mr Cashmore has turned Mashable into a global media company.
  5. Oculus VR: Palmer Luckey founded Oculus VR in June 2012, when he was 19. In August that year, Oculus launched its Kickstarter campaign and raised more than $1 million in three days. Facebook bought Oculus for $2 billion two years later.
if you go

The flights

Direct flights from the UAE to the Nepalese capital, Kathmandu, are available with Air Arabia, (www.airarabia.com) Fly Dubai (www.flydubai.com) or Etihad (www.etihad.com) from Dh1,200 return including taxes. The trek described here started from Jomson, but there are many other start and end point variations depending on how you tailor your trek. To get to Jomson from Kathmandu you must first fly to the lake-side resort town of Pokhara with either Buddha Air (www.buddhaair.com) or Yeti Airlines (www.yetiairlines.com). Both charge around US$240 (Dh880) return. From Pokhara there are early morning flights to Jomson with Yeti Airlines or Simrik Airlines (www.simrikairlines.com) for around US$220 (Dh800) return. 

The trek

Restricted area permits (US$500 per person) are required for trekking in the Upper Mustang area. The challenging Meso Kanto pass between Tilcho Lake and Jomson should not be attempted by those without a lot of mountain experience and a good support team. An excellent trekking company with good knowledge of Upper Mustang, the Annaurpuna Circuit and Tilcho Lake area and who can help organise a version of the trek described here is the Nepal-UK run Snow Cat Travel (www.snowcattravel.com). Prices vary widely depending on accommodation types and the level of assistance required. 

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