Women's series planned after success of UAE-Israel men's rugby event

Dubai - The UAE and Israel men's rugby teams played exhibition games in Dubai on Friday

Having warmed hearts around the world with their exhibition of solidarity through a couple of games of men’s rugby on Friday, the UAE and Israel rugby associations are now planning to build on their friendship.

And it’s the women that would play the lead role in their next plan as the UAE national team head coach Apollo Perelini have confirmed that talks are already underway on taking the UAE women’s team to Israel for a series of ‘friendship matches’.

“There have already been talks on that. The talks started even before they arrived in the UAE for these matches. We are looking to take our women’s team there for a series of matches,” Perelini told Khaleej Times, moments after Friday’s two exhibition matches at the Dubai Sports City.

Perelini takes great pride in his success of fielding a team of Emirati players for the historic match against the Israel Sevens team.

The former New Zealand rugby star also revealed that an all-Emirati rugby team would be playing in Israel.

“We already have an Emirati women’s team. We will be travelling over to Tel Aviv for UAE vs Israel women’s rugby friendly matches. That will be another round of friendship matches. And it’s important, you know, we are trying to be ambassadors of the two countries,” he said.

“Hopefully, if the pandemic situation improves, we are looking at the possibility of going with the women’s team to Tel Aviv soon and do the same exchange. And today was just the beginning of our relationship.”

And the start to the new relationship on Friday was an emotional moment for Perelini.

“It was quite an emotional experience, because you know, I don’t think people really realise the impact of this sort of events has made to the relationship of the Arabs and Israelis. It was amazing,” he said.