Emosi Vecanuau makes a run for Abu Dhabi Harlequins during their 27-5 win over Bahrain on Friday. Satish Kumar for The National
Emosi Vecanuau makes a run for Abu Dhabi Harlequins during their 27-5 win over Bahrain on Friday. Satish Kumar for The National

Abu Dhabi Harlequins bounce back to winning ways in West Asia Premiership with Bahrain triumph



Having seen a three-year unbeaten home record ended seven days earlier, Abu Dhabi Harlequins set about starting a new streak with a valuable win over Bahrain at Zayed Sports City on Friday.

Phil Brady, Luke Stevenson and Andrew Semple scored the tries as the defending West Asia Premiership champions climbed back above Jebel Ali Dragons at the top of the table.

With Dragons being without a match this weekend, Harlequins’ win was enough to edge them back into a single-point lead at the top, ahead of their conquerors from last week.

Although the final winning margin suggested a comfortable win for the home side, the run of play in the first half in particular was quite the opposite.

Brady crashed over with the first attack of the game, but they were forced to withstand 35 minutes of pressure from then until the interval.

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They were not helped by their own indiscipline, as they lost two players to yellow cards. The fact they made it to the break with a 7-0 advantage in tact was due to their own doughty defence, as well as profligacy by the Bahrain attack.

Ironically, the travelling side managed their only score, a try through Rhys Fitzgerald, when they themselves were down to 14-men due to a yellow card.

Once they were back to the full quota, however, Harlequins stretched away, adding further tries via sparkling breaks by Stevenson and Semple.

“We all took it pretty badly last week, as it has been three years since we last lost at home, and it came as a bit of a shock because we didn’t really turn up,” Stevenson said.

“We knew that if we played our game we probably should have won last week. We didn’t, and they deserved it, so it was something for us to set a marker at.

“We started well today, then the yellow cards came at the worst possible time for us. We had 13 men, and we kept them scoreless for 15 minutes, which was down to good work rate.

“That is one thing we wanted to improve from last week, to make sure the work rate was higher, and keep the ball. It was pleasing to get through that first half.”

Another defeat on the road leaves Bahrain with ground to make up if they are to challenge for honours at the business end of the season.

Louie Tonkin, the Bahrain coach, said “mental issues” are holding his side back from reaching their full potential.

“I asked the boys [post match], ‘What is it?’ and I think it is down to belief, if we are honest,” Tonkin said.

“We probably had 80 per cent territory and possession in that first half, and created five try scoring opportunities, but didn’t score any of them.

“When you exert that much pressure on someone, and keep letting them off the hook, all you are doing is feeding their belief, while you are losing belief.”

Nayanthara: Beyond The Fairy Tale

Starring: Nayanthara, Vignesh Shivan, Radhika Sarathkumar, Nagarjuna Akkineni

Director: Amith Krishnan

Rating: 3.5/5

Company%20Profile
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About Okadoc

Date started: Okadoc, 2018

Founder/CEO: Fodhil Benturquia

Based: Dubai, UAE

Sector: Healthcare

Size: (employees/revenue) 40 staff; undisclosed revenues recording “double-digit” monthly growth

Funding stage: Series B fundraising round to conclude in February

Investors: Undisclosed

COMPANY PROFILE
Name: ARDH Collective
Based: Dubai
Founders: Alhaan Ahmed, Alyina Ahmed and Maximo Tettamanzi
Sector: Sustainability
Total funding: Self funded
Number of employees: 4
How to turn your property into a holiday home
  1. Ensure decoration and styling – and portal photography – quality is high to achieve maximum rates.
  2. Research equivalent Airbnb homes in your location to ensure competitiveness.
  3. Post on all relevant platforms to reach the widest audience; whether you let personally or via an agency know your potential guest profile – aiming for the wrong demographic may leave your property empty.
  4. Factor in costs when working out if holiday letting is beneficial. The annual DCTM fee runs from Dh370 for a one-bedroom flat to Dh1,200. Tourism tax is Dh10-15 per bedroom, per night.
  5. Check your management company has a physical office, a valid DTCM licence and is licencing your property and paying tourism taxes. For transparency, regularly view your booking calendar.
The specs

Engine: 1.5-litre 4-cylinder petrol

Power: 154bhp

Torque: 250Nm

Transmission: 7-speed automatic with 8-speed sports option 

Price: From Dh79,600

On sale: Now

From Zero

Artist: Linkin Park

Label: Warner Records

Number of tracks: 11

Rating: 4/5

Iran's dirty tricks to dodge sanctions

There’s increased scrutiny on the tricks being used to keep commodities flowing to and from blacklisted countries. Here’s a description of how some work.

1 Going Dark

A common method to transport Iranian oil with stealth is to turn off the Automatic Identification System, an electronic device that pinpoints a ship’s location. Known as going dark, a vessel flicks the switch before berthing and typically reappears days later, masking the location of its load or discharge port.

2. Ship-to-Ship Transfers

A first vessel will take its clandestine cargo away from the country in question before transferring it to a waiting ship, all of this happening out of sight. The vessels will then sail in different directions. For about a third of Iranian exports, more than one tanker typically handles a load before it’s delivered to its final destination, analysts say.

3. Fake Destinations

Signaling the wrong destination to load or unload is another technique. Ships that intend to take cargo from Iran may indicate their loading ports in sanction-free places like Iraq. Ships can keep changing their destinations and end up not berthing at any of them.

4. Rebranded Barrels

Iranian barrels can also be rebranded as oil from a nation free from sanctions such as Iraq. The countries share fields along their border and the crude has similar characteristics. Oil from these deposits can be trucked out to another port and documents forged to hide Iran as the origin.

* Bloomberg

Company%20profile
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The specs

Engine: 1.5-litre, 4-cylinder turbo

Transmission: CVT

Power: 170bhp

Torque: 220Nm

Price: Dh98,900

What She Ate: Six Remarkable Women & the Food That Tells Their Stories
Laura Shapiro
Fourth Estate

SNAPSHOT

While Huawei did launch the first smartphone with a 50MP image sensor in its P40 series in 2020, Oppo in 2014 introduced the Find 7, which was capable of taking 50MP images: this was done using a combination of a 13MP sensor and software that resulted in shots seemingly taken from a 50MP camera.

Citadel: Honey Bunny first episode

Directors: Raj & DK

Stars: Varun Dhawan, Samantha Ruth Prabhu, Kashvi Majmundar, Kay Kay Menon

Rating: 4/5

SPECS
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Sri Lanka's T20I squad

Thisara Perera (captain), Dilshan Munaweera, Danushka Gunathilaka, Sadeera Samarawickrama, Ashan Priyanjan, Mahela Udawatte, Dasun Shanaka, Sachith Pathirana, Vikum Sanjaya, Lahiru Gamage, Seekkuge Prasanna, Vishwa Fernando, Isuru Udana, Jeffrey Vandersay and Chathuranga de Silva.

While you're here

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Kareem Shaheen: I owe everything to Beirut

Raghida Dergham: We have to bounce back

ILT20%20UAE%20stars
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COMPANY%20PROFILE%20
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding