I have written tennis. I covered the entirety of Wimbledon in 1985 and 1986. The first year, some German kid named Boris Becker won. The second year, he won again. Tennis is fairly far down the list of sports I know best … and sports I like. But when the staffing situation at the paper […]

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I didn’t really plan to watch the Lakers in their season-opener on Christmas Day. The game didn’t start until 2:30 p.m. in Los Angeles (which was early December 26 here in the UAE), and I prefer my sports-from-the-other-side-of-the-world to end about that time. Not start. But the night kinda dragged on, and when I got […]

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I live on an island, but I rarely think about the beaches that line long stretches of the south end and west end of it. Until this time of year, when going to the Corniche is as good a way as any to spend a day off on December 24. What to do when you […]

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The world of professional football (international variety) seems enormous. Countries you couldn’t find on a map have professional leagues. Countries you’ve never heard of have leagues. Countries like England and Germany have about 28 tiers of leagues. I’ve been writing from the UAE for more than two years and, admit it, most of you have […]

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Eight months of the year, the idea that regular guys and kids might go outside for a kick-about, as the Brits call it, would seem exotic. It’s too hot, and by the time it’s not quite so hot it’s midnight, and even in a country that tends to be nocturnal in the summer, that’s too […]

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One of the touted summer signings in UAE soccer was of Jakson Coelho, familiarily known as “Jaja” … a Brazilian attacking midfielder who had been playing in Turkey with Trabzonspor. Al Ahli, one of the Dubai sides, signed him to a three-year, 4.5 million euro ($5.9 million) deal. That’s real money. The idea was to pair […]

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Hard to overstate how big the arrival of Diego Maradona on these shores has been. The former Argentina superstar and national team coach, whose life almost was extinguished by drug abuse a decade-plus ago … has been received with open arms in the UAE and, especially, Dubai … and he seems to be returning the […]

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We here in the UAE are very interested in the 2011-12 Volvo Ocean Race. For several good reasons: 1) Abu Dhabi is sponsoring one of the six boats in the round-the-world event; 2) Abu Dhabi is one of the ports o’ call during the race; and 3) the whole thing is just a lot of […]

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Interesting story this weekend up the road in Dubai. Lexi Thompson, 16-year-old American from Florida, rolled into the big city up the coast from Abu Dhabi and won the Dubai Ladies Masters by four shots. Pretty much blew away the field of, mostly, Ladies European Tour pros. Thompson now is the youngest woman to win, […]

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  It’s possible to do Christmas in the UAE, but it takes a bit of extra effort. It’s not like you’re going to find Christmas-tree lots on every corner. Malls may pipe in “wintry” music and create tableaux adorned with some sort of plastic snow (the UAE loves the concept of winter, never having actually […]

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