Are there Premier League football matches taking place in Dubai? You would think so judging by the amount of clubs that are taking a break here this week.

This weekend the FA Cup 4th round takes place, and the teams who have been knocked out already have a weekend off. So, where is the first port-of-call? Dubai, obvs!

The English premier league differs to most of the European leagues in that they don’t have a winter break, so it’s not uncommon for managers to allow their players take a break or warm weather training during occasions like this. 

Leicester City

The club top of the league who narrowly lost to Arsenal on Sunday last, headed straight to Dubai from London. Their manager, Claudio Ranieri was taking time out in Rome, and when asked where his players would be during their week off, he said ‘I don’t know, Dubai maybe’.

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Premier League top scorer Jamie Vardy, is seen below playing with a pet tiger. 

Football reporter love Ranieri’s managerial style!

Ranieri giving the Leicester players a week off, to go “to Dubai or somewhere.”

— Paul Hayward (@_PaulHayward) February 14, 2016

Jamie Vardy is having a party.. with a tiger!

Most amazing experience…. pic.twitter.com/Kld1vk7uDz

— Rebekah Vardy (@RebekahVardy) February 19, 2016

Stoke City

Manager Mark Hughes was forced to defend his players mid season break to Dubai. Hughes, the ultimate professional, stated: 

“There are real benefits that we glean from trips of this nature. We did it last season and came back and had a great finish to the season. We’re hoping that’s going to be the case again this time. We’ll have four or five days in Dubai. It’s an opportunity to review things.’

The players go to the Meydan races

A few familiar @stokecity faces out and about in Dubai… https://t.co/eGM8fBo0OH #SCFC pic.twitter.com/6uUtkgFhK4

— StokeonTrentLive (@Sotlive) February 19, 2016

Muniesa enjoys the day off!

Enjoying Dubai with the team! ???????? Have a nice day! pic.twitter.com/OlHFuusO6X

— Marc Muniesa (@muniesa92) February 17, 2016

Bojan is lovin’ Dubai beach life!

Sunderland 

Sunderland are in a relegation scrap. They just beat Manchester United at the stadium of light last weekend, but remain in the relegation zone. Manager Sam Allardyce uses performance data to measure the benefits of a hot weather break on his team’s performance over a long season.

“For me it [Dubai] has always been a very important time. It puts that very difficult Christmas and New Year period [behind you], where it’s raining, it’s windy, it’s cold, it’s black, it’s wet, it’s dark when you come in, it’s dark when you go home, and then you get to Dubai and it’s 75 degrees [Fahrenheit].

Big Sam has his say.

Yann M’Vila uber cool in Dubai.

Norwich City

Another Premier League team who have been knocked out of the FA Cup are Norwich City, they have chose to spend a few days in Abu Dhabi instead of Dubai! Not all fans are impressed.

Just been thinking about Norwich going go Abu Dhabi for ‘warm climate training’ and its actually quite disgraceful. The club can afford…

— Tyler Evans (@TylerEvansNCFC) February 17, 2016

So basically, if Leicester win the league, Stoke qualify for Europe and Sunderland stay up, we will know that the trips to Dubai paid off. And if Norwich get relegated, we will know they should have come to Dubai instead of Abu Dhabi!