Kevin Eason for the TimesThe room key they handed Robinho, Manchester City’s £32 million striker, as he checked into Abu Dhabi’s lavish Emirates Palace hotel probably summed up why he was there. Not so much a key as currency to move around the extraordinary seven-star hotel.
The key came in the form of a plastic replica of a gold coin that tripped the electronic door of the Brazilian’s palatial room, complete with 50-inch plasma television and gold taps in the bathroom.
Money doesn’t just talk in the Gulf, it opens doors. And the doors being pushed open by the most ambitious Gulf states, such as Abu Dhabi, Qatar, Bahrain and Dubai, lead to the offices of the world’s biggest sports, who just love the colour of Arab money. Even footballers such as Robinho, with his diamond-studded earrings and mega-salary, and England’s footballers looked on in awe as they toured Qatar and Abu Dhabi last week.
Almost alone in a world shattered by a banking crisis, there is still plenty of cash in the Middle East and the leading Gulf nations want to spend it on sports events that will raise their profile and help wean their economies off the petrodollar. From digging for oil, they are digging for sporting gold.
A snapshot from the Gulf from the past few weeks underlines just how the region is influencing some of the world’s biggest sports. The Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, the final race of the Formula One season played out on the world’s most opulent and expensive track, has been followed by a match between Robinho’s Manchester City — Abu Dhabi’s adopted home team since it was bought by Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the dollar trillionaire — and a United Arab Emirates side. Then came England on Saturday night playing a friendly against Brazil — a dream fixture played out in the heat of Qatar’s Khalifa International Stadium, thanks to a £5 million match fee.
Sounds like sporting paradise? There is so much more: tennis, volleyball, the Fifa Beach Soccer World Cup in Dubai, a $250,000 (about £150,000) triathlon and more international cricket are on their way to the Gulf while next weekend, the finest golfers on the European Tour play for their biggest prize.
The title says it all: the winner of the European Tour is actually the winner of the Race to Dubai, the end of a yellow brick road of gold and a bonus pot of $7.5 million — with $1.5 million to the victor, who will be decided by the Dubai World Championship. For tiny countries the size of large cities, with no sporting heritage, the Gulf states punch way above their weight in the global sports market.
They paved the way in Britain with massive sponsorship deals, led by the Dubai-based Emirates Airline, which has its name over Arsenal’s stadium and shirts in a deal worth £100 million. The naming rights have been so successful that the airline has increased its sports’ sponsorship budget tenfold in a decade, putting its brand on motor racing and even the England sevens rugby union team. Golf has followed with Rory McIlroy, Europe’s most promising young golfer, sponsored by Dubai’s Jumeirah hotels and resorts group, while a succession of Gulf-based consortiums seem to have queued up to acquire Premier League clubs, culminating in the sale of Manchester City.
But those sponsorship deals and acquisitions are only a prologue. The leaders of the Gulf states are becoming more ambitious: Qatar will be in the running to host the 2022 World Cup, while Dubai is running the rule over bidding for the 2020 Olympic Games. They are bids that would once have been laughed out of boardrooms of Fifa and the IOC. Not now.
These key Gulf states not only want sport to transform their oil-based economies, they want it to affirm their status in the world. And when they want something they have the money to build it or buy it. “They see sport as a way of putting themselves on the map,” said Dr Sean Ennis, an expert in sports marketing who splits his time between Strathclyde University and the Middle East. “You cannot underestimate what they are doing. They are vastly wealthy and very determined. They want the hallmark events in sport to make a global impact.”
Dan Jones, head of the Deloitte Sports Business Group, said: “They have wealth but they also want national pride. As the oil runs out, they also need to find ways of changing their economies and tourism is one way to do that. Dubai led the way but the rest are following pretty quickly and events such as a Formula One race are seen as ways to attract people in.” The Gulf’s relationship with Formula One was tenuous, to say the least. Now it boasts two grands prix, in Abu Dhabi and Bahrain, at a time when Britain is in danger of not having a race at all.
Inevitably, both states built showpiece tracks, with Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina reputed to have cost as much as £800 million. But more than that, companies from the Emirates are now shareholders in Formula One’s best teams: the Mubadala Development Company holds a 5 per cent stake in Ferrari, and Bahrain’s Mumtalakat Holdings has 30 per cent of Lewis Hamilton’s McLaren team.
Jenson Button’s world championship-winning Brawn GP squad could be next — with Abu Dhabi’s Aabar group rumoured to be ready to become a leading stakeholder. How long before a Formula One car is made in a Gulf state, particularly after the Williams team set up a centre in Qatar to pioneer new car technologies?
Football, though, is the obsession. But the question now is whether the leaders of Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Qatar have the patience as well as the money. “In their culture, the leadership is used to getting what it wants,” Ennis said. “If they buy something, they expect it to work and they often do not understand the nuances of the West, in particular. When they buy a football team like Manchester City, they feel they have spent the cash so the team should win, when we all know it isn’t that easy.
“They believe they can spend money and win an Olympics or a World Cup because they want to host these massive events to create a tourist industry, and they cannot understand why the world has doubts about their ability to stage these big set-piece occasions.”
But the leaders of these fabulously wealthy Gulf states know it is only a matter of time. Individually, a Middle East sheikh can buy a football club and splash £32 million on a Brazilian striker. Collectively, the Middle East states of Qatar, Dubai and Abu Dhabi have the biggest buying power in sport. And it shows.
Splashing the cash
£800 million Estimated cost of Abu Dhabi’s Yas Marina Formula One circuit
£170m Transfer spending in 2009 by Abu Dhabi-owned Manchester City
$60m Race fee paid by Abu Dhabi Yas Marina circuit to Bernie Ecclestone
$20m Tiger Woods paid to design his first golf course, The Tiger Woods Dubai
$1.25m Winner’s prize at golf’s Dubai World Championship next weekend
$6m Prize for the Dubai World Cup, world’s richest horse race
30 per cent Holding in McLaren team held by Bahrain’s Mumtalakat
Centres of excellence
Dubai
What’s on Dubai World Cup golf: the culmination of the European Tour’s Race to Dubai this weekend. Dubai Desert Classic: the Gulf’s $2.5 million (about £1.5million) golf tournament. Emirates Airline Dubai Rugby Sevens: 16 top teams watched by more than 130,000 people; also staged the World Cup Sevens. Barclays Dubai Tennis Championships: important tour event in February. Fifa Beach Soccer World Cup. Dubai World Cup: richest horse race meeting in the world, worth $10 million. Cricket: regular fixtures featuring countries from around the globe.
What’s big Dubai Sports City, the world’s biggest and most lavish sports destination with a 60,000-seat stadium, 25,000-seat cricket ground, 10,000-seat indoor arena and a 5,000-seat hockey stadium. The city has 70,000 inhabitants, while Dubai is also the headquarters of the International Cricket Council. Also has massive winter sports centre — so good they have mulled over bidding to host a Winter Olympics. The new Meydan racecourse, which hosts the Dubai World Cup in March, has a 1,000-metre long grandstand and has cost almost £1 billion.
What’s new Most ambitious and innovative nation in the Gulf wants to host an Olympics, with a bid likely for the 2020 Games.
Bahrain
What’s on Bahrain Grand Prix: first race in the Formula One calendar next year.
What’s big Bahrain International Circuit, the first Formula One circuit to host a grand prix in the Gulf and now the region’s busiest track, hosting dozens of races annually.
What’s new More motor racing. More conservative than its neighbours.
Qatar
What’s on England versus Brazil international friendly football, a money-spinning showcase for Qatar. Sony Ericsson WTA Championships: one of the biggest tournaments in women’s tennis. FIVB Club World Volleyball Championships: the biggest club tournament in the sport. Commercial Bank Qatar Masters: another lavish stop on golf’s European Tour. ExxonMobil Qatar Open Tennis Championships: the season opener for the men’s tour in January. The World Indoor Athletics Championships.
What’s big Aspire — Qatar’s dedicated sports academy with sophisticated training centres and stadiums. Has the world’s biggest indoor venue. Used as centre for the Asian Games in 2006, the biggest single sports event outside the Olympics with 13,000 athletes.
Seen by many as a rehearsal for an Olympics.
What’s new Big aspirations from a small country with Qatar bidding to host the 2022 World Cup.
Abu Dhabi
What’s on Manchester City versus the UAE national team: Abu Dhabi’s adopted Premier League outfit puts on a show for the locals. Abu Dhabi Golf Championship: season opener in January, won twice by Britain’s Paul Casey. International Powerboat Racing: Abu Dhabi is a leading centre for the Formula One racing of the sea. Abu Dhabi $250,000 International Triathlon. Capitala World Tennis Championships: six of the world’s top ten men compete for $250,000 prize next month; Andy Murray won last year’s tournament. Fifa Club World Cup: Barcelona head the list of international clubs next month. Abu Dhabi Grand Prix: Formula One on the most expensive track in history; won rights to host the season-finisher earlier this month.
What’s good The Yas Marina Formula One circuit. Estimates range between £250 million and more than £800 million for the construction of this jewel in Formula One’s crown. Set a benchmark for standards that will probably never be surpassed. Still produced a dull grand prix, though. Also has an international-standard ice rink.
What’s new Has got the Fifa Club World Cup and wants to host cricket World Cup matches. No word on anything grander.
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