Ronaldo and Del Piero to kick-off Dubai Sports Confab

Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldo and Italian legend Alessandro Del Piero will be the keynote speakers at the sixth Dubai International Sports Conference which will be held on Wednesday and Thursday at the Intercontinental Hotel of Festival City in Dubai.

Held under the patronage of Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Sports Council, the two-day event will discuss topics related to 'Football Companies … Current and Future Trends'.

Ronaldo and Del Piero are slated to speak at 12.15pm on their successful career on Wednesday.

A former World Player of the Year, Portuguese striker Ronaldo had a successful stint at Premier League champions Manchester United before moving to Spain.

Del Piero, A World Cup winner in 2006, is still going strong for Juventus at age 37.

England manager Fabio Capello also returns to the conference to discuss about clubs investments in players during the final session on Thursday.

The tournament will kick-off with a view from the top by Barcelona president Sandro Rossell who will talk about their business plan.

FC Porto chairman Jorge Pinto Da Costa will lecture on how to manage financial resources, UEFA secretary-general on financial fair play and Giovanni Branchini on role of players' agents.

Dr Ahmed Al Sharif, secretary general of DSC will speak about the future vision for football companies in Dubai, chairman of Al Wasl board Marwan bin Bayat on their company role model while the vice-president of the UAE Pro League committee will discuss the challenges faced by UAE clubs.

Charles Allen, head of marketing of Arsenal and Guy-Laurent Epstein, marketing manager of UEFA will give the business talk on to open proceedings on Thursday.

Peter Kenyon, former CEO of Manchester United and Chelsea, and Ali Al Ahmed, chief corporate communications officer Etisalat will discuss about investing in partnerships.

This will be followed by a session on evolution of football.

Sheikh Hamdan welcoming the participants, said: "DSC has earlier started mobilizing the sports sector to join the field of professionalism as an inevitable consequence for sports development in the area and the world in general. Accordingly, we have decided to organize an international sports conference to be joined by world experts and specialists to show experiences and meet sports sector's members in UAE / provide visions and tackle means to enhance local sports corporations such as: UAE Football Association and clubs, attain administrative development to manage sports corporations, decide successful plans and strategies to promote the level of professionalism in UAE and the general area."    

Mater Al Tayer, the Deputy Chairman of DSC stated: "We have put Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed's directives as a method of work to base the Council's strategy. Thanks to the great support of Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, Dubai International Sports Conference has attracted eminent speakers and participants, acquired distinctive status and enriched UAE's sports sector."

The Fifa World Cup and Uefa's Europa and Champions League trophies will be on show at the conference.

Dr Aisha Bu Sumait, the conference director, said: "We are keen to bring and show those cups during the conference's programmes to reflect the hard work and diligence exerted by winning clubs and national teams.

"Today we will show the Fifa World Cup for the second time along with the other two prestigious European cups — the Uefa European Champions League and Europa League Cup."
 
Each of the three cups will be shown on a separate platform during the launch of the conference. The cups will then be shown in a special section of the conference's exhibition. It is the first time the three titles have been shown together in one place. The trophies are currently held by Spain, Barcelona and Porto.

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