All eyes on Aswan

here we go, Egypt is starting its friendly matches in its preparation for Ghana 2008.next Saturday, city of Aswan will host the match between Egypt-Namibia in Aswan stadium. the event is considered a festival in the city long prominent for its monuments and archaeological sites, as the tickets were sold out only after one day. Egypt will then travel to abu dhabi to meet Mali and to Portugal to play with Angola. Egypt will be missing some players and Namibia will be missing a little bit more - their coach-.a close up on the two teams, their conditions, players and latest news from Egyptian camp.

let’s start with the guests, Namibia arrived in Egypt last Tuesday passing through hard conditions lately; after qualifying to Ghana 2008 with a last minute goal against Ethiopia, Zambian manager Ben Bamfuchile was considered a national hero.unfortunately, mr.bamfuchile resigned a month ago citing ill treatment by Namibia Football Association officials. the reason was -as he told reporters- that he was ill.later news in Egyptian news paper said that he died last week.today, Namibia named Dutchman Arie Schans as their replacement to go with them to Ghana later this month.

latest result for Namibia say that they conceded three defeats from morocco 2/0, Saudi Arabia,1/0 and Tunisia 2/0.well, new manager mr.schans chose 24 players for this match, 10 play in south Africa, 1 in Germany and 1 in Norway.although i didn’t watch them play,but they should be like typical African teams, distinguished by physical power and high spirit.there are no large expectations for Namibia in Ghana 2008.

the hosts, Egypt, had their hard times as well. in the qualifications, Egypt won 3 matches and drawn 3 failing to win outside Egypt against teams like Burundi, Botswana and Mauritania. winning their last match in Cairo stadium against Botswana 1/0 in a last 10 minutes goal. a thing which has aroused doubts about the future of hassan shehata’s job. the guy stayed on hot seats for nearly a month after declaring that he will stay till his contract ends after Ghana 2008.

Egypt then participated in the Arab games with the first team to beat UAE, Sudan. Saudi Arabia and equalize with Libya to win the gold medal. the participation was controversial because of its time and the level of teams participating in it.

the squad

but here we are now, the national team started it’s preparation camp last week, training twice every day. shehata chose 32 players to choose 23 players from them to be in the final list. this primary list witnessed the return of old names like tarek el sayed (zamalek), Ahmed fathi (ahli). also it witnessed new comers like Ahmed shabaan (petrojet), motasem salem (ismaily), wael khalifa ( el geish). shehata chose 7 professionals from outside egypt: Mohamed zidan (hamburg), ghaly (tottenham), Mohamed shawky (middlesbrough), Ahmed hassan (anderlecht), wael gomaa (seleya, qatar), hassan mostafa (wahda, Saudi Arabia) and Ibrahim said (anqara)

for this match, 2 players were excluded from the list because of injury. doubts remain about Ibrahim said who has a knee injury. other absentees are Mohamed shawky because of a slight injury in his knee that will need 2 days, Mohamed zidan because medical tests in hamburg and will be back on Sunday. while mido is still in doubt, reports say that he started training with middlesbrough last week but we are waiting for the medical report to be issued next Tuesday to determine if he can participate in Ghana or not.

generally, the match against Namibia will not be enough to judge the team.as the chance will be given to substitute players to prove themselves and earn the manager trust but it will give us an idea of the general shape of the team.

player transfers

hossam ghaly: rumors are leaking around about the future of ghaly in the premiership. strong negotiations to join wegan are ongoing. but he said that nothing is confirmed and that there is an offer from another English club but he refused to mention it’s name.
ibrahim said: confirmed that he will return to Egypt and that he is negotiating with both cairo giants ahly and zamalek. it is worth mentioning that he played for both clubs before.
abd el monsef: zamalek troubled goal keeper took the permission from shehata to travel to Netherlands for a trial in one of the clubs there. worth mentioning that he had an offer from lazio before the start of the season but the club refused it because they needed him.

wait for post-match commentary and latest news