Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli has been ranked above the Argentinean and Barcelona football legend Lionel Messi as one of the most valuable brands among sports athletes by Forbes.
Were Vikings Muslims?
New discovery finds ‘Allah’ woven into clothes
Researchers in Sweden have found Arabic characters woven into burial costumes from Viking boat graves. The discovery raises new questions about the influence of Islam in Scandinavia.
They were kept in storage for more than 100 years, dismissed as typical examples of Viking Age funeral clothes.
The breakthrough was made by textile archaeologist Annika Larsson of Uppsala University while re-examining the remnants of burial costumes from male and female boat and chamber graves originally excavated in Birka and Gamla Uppsala in Sweden in the late 19th and mid-20th centuries.
She became interested in the forgotten fragments after realising the material had come from central Asia, Persia and China.
There were two words that kept recurring. One of them she identified with the help of an Iranian colleague. It was the name “Ali” — the fourth caliph of Islam.
But the word next to Ali was more difficult to decipher.
To unlock the puzzle, she enlarged the letters and examined them from all angles, including from behind. Enlarging the patterns and looking at the reflection in a mirror revealed the word “Allah”.
Brand Kohli beats Messi on Forbes top-10 list
Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli has been ranked above the Argentinean and Barcelona football legend Lionel Messi as 
According to the list, the 28-year-old Indian star player is placed at the seventh spot with a brand value of $14.5 million, compared to Messi’s $13.5 million.
Roger Federer tops the list with a brand value of $37.2 million, followed by basketball star LeBron James with $33.4 million and Usain Bolt with $27 million. Cristiano Ronaldo is at number four with $21.5m.
Forbes calculates the brand value of an athlete by subtracting the average income of the top-10 athletes in the same sport from the total earnings of that athlete, excluding salary and bonus from their sport and all investment income.
Compiled by Usama Rasheed
