Can Qatar or Abu Dhabi really usurp Dubai as the best place to work in the Gulf?

Let battle commence - Dubai has looked up from its debt troubles to realise it has some serious challengers to its position as the region's leading financial centre. But can it manage to convince financial services firms to recruit in significant numbers again?

The popular perception of Dubai as, according to one headhunter, "a Clint Eastwood film set with brushwood running down the streets" is, of course, a fallacy and has largely come about because of the drawn-out Dubai World debt fiasco.

Things are looking up a bit on that front anyway - Moody's has just confirmed a stable outlook for DP World.

And the DIFC now looks in a fighting mood; having finally conceded that it may need to reduce the cost of doing business in the free zone, it's also re-hired Marwan Lutfi (who helped create the finance hub in 2004) as deputy chief executive to drive its "next phase of growth".

It faces some real threats. The possible merger between the Dubai and Abu Dhabi exchange could prove significant in terms of the latter's growing influence as a financial centre. And Qatar's increasing attraction has been well-reported.

Peter Greaves, director of financial markets at executive search firm McArthur Murray, concedes that recruitment in investment banking, private equity and asset management within Dubai has slowed, but insists the emirate remains the key place for firms to base themselves in the region.

"Qatar is increasingly a serious option," he says. "But in terms of lifestyle and infrastructure it still seriously lags Dubai, as does Abu-Dhabi, which means Dubai remains the location of choice for most financial services workers in the region."

Just how serious a contender Qatar will become remains open to debate, but it's certainly replaced Saudi in the 'new-place-to-be' stakes.

Recruiter Kinsey Allen predicts that a massive 5,200 new financial services jobs will be created in Qatar by the end of 2010, with its appeal to expat bankers in particular increasing.

One encouraging sign of the Peninsula's appeal is the fact that top investment banker Anthony Armstrong, previously head of Credit Suisse's M&A division for the MENA region, has joined Qatar Holding - the investment arm of sovereign wealth fund Qatar Investment Authority.

This could have something to do with Qatar Holding's stake in Credit Suisse, however, rather than a signal of the emirate's potential growth prospects.