Developing Rugby Nations - United Arab Emirates

The UAE have announced that they will make no changes to their youthful side for the second leg of the HSBC Asian Sevens Series which takes place in Bangkok this weekend.

The tournament will consist of 16 teams and will take place at the IPE Stadium, Baeng Sen from the 20th to the 22nd.

Joining the 12 core teams, who participate in all four ranked Asian Sevens tournaments in 2013, will be joined by four more sides, who have been invited by the host nation to join the competition. The additional unions are Cambodia, India, Laos and Uzbekistan.

The additional four teams will play a round-robin tournament between there selves on the first day of the competition, as a way of ranking the four teams from 13 to 16 in the tournament.

As the competition gets under way on the second day, the four teams will then compete with the bottom teams of the core 12 in each pool and compete for the Bowl and the Shield.

The UAE, who Talking Rugby Union is focusing on in the tournament because of their youthful team, have been drawn in Pool C with third-ranked South Korea, Malaysia and Cambodia.

Although they had a disappointing opening leg of the Asian Sevens Series in Malaysia a fortnight ago, the UAE Rugby Federation are ‘sticking to their guns’ and continuing their policy of giving opportunities to young, talented Emirate players on the international stage.

In Malaysia the UAE lost to Chinese Taipei 32-0 and the Philippines 38-0 in the pool matches, and went down fighting to Singapore in the semi-final 15-7 before losing to China 41-0 in the 11th/12th place playoff.

The UAE Rugby Federation is in the process of team building and is looking to focus on creating a young, energetic Emirati squad for the future. The UAERF have highlighted the Asian Games in South Korea next year as their first goal, as they are working towards qualifying a representative team.

Although these processes always take time, the UAE is already reaping some success thanks to the emergence of 18 year old youngster Abdulla Mubarak Al Hajri from Al Ain, who is poised to make his debut this weekend at the Thailand Sevens.

Al Hajri is a prospect of the HSBC’s Player Pathway Program (PPP) begun more than a year ago.

The UAE should be commemorated for their dedication to developing rugby in young players and particularly in under developed rugby nations. Four of the team’s twelve man squad for the coming Thailand Sevens are aged just 18.

UAERF secretary general Qais Abdulla Al Dhalai lauded HSBC for their contribution to help scout Emirati talent.

"Hats off to HSBC for their utmost commitment towards spreading out the sport of rugby within the Emirati youth population all over the UAE," he said pointing out to the emergence of future Emirati rugby stars.

"Marcus Hurry and Mohammed Ismael were both an inspiration behind the UAERF success and fully supporting in having Emirati youngsters making their international debuts and representing the nation at the rugby sevens. As we all witnessed last year with the appearance of Majid Albalooshi and this year with Saeed Al Mehairi, Shaheen Ismail, Suhail Yaqoob at KL 7s (Malaysia) and now again with Abdulla Al Hajri from Al Ain at the upcoming Bangkok Sevens," he said.

UAE Squad:

Abdallah Mubarak Mohammed Al-Hajri
Adel Mustafa Ahmed Alhaj Mohammed AlHendi
Ali Mohammed Ghulam
Yousef Ahmad Mohamed Ahmed Shaker
Cyrus Parviz Ali Asghar Pourhomayoun
Majid Mohammed Darwish Salem AlBalooshi
Saeed Ibrahim Bilal Abdulla Saad
Taleb Abdulrazzaq Yousuf AlKhaja
Hareb Hamdan Hareb Hamad Al Azri
Mohannad Ahmad Mohamed Ahmed Shaker
Walid Salem Mohamed Salem Salem Al Balushi
Suhail Yaqoob Abbad Ali Salah