Eye of the hub: Sheikh Zayed cricket stadium in Abu Dhabi. Inset: David East

By Richard Edwards
THE notion of the UAE being one of the central hubs in global cricket would have been laughable when David East played for Essex.
The former wicketkeeper – a mainstay of the most successful side in the county’s history throughout the Eighties – played at a time when the massive redevelopment of the UAE was still very much in the minds of architects, rather than in bricks and mortar in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
The first ODI played in the Middle East was in Sharjah in 1984, with...