Oman 0 – Egypt 1: Time to worry!!

Watching the game against Oman wasn’t a pleasant experience; no defense, no midfield, no attack, no teamwork, no tactics, no team chemistry….etc, it was just spontaneous play and great goal keeping from El Hadary,

I was left extremely anxious about Algeria’s game.

As I said in the preview, the victory is meaningless if it isn’t accompanied by a good performance, team work and mentality; however, we didn’t show any of that.

As I was watching the game, I thought that this isn’t the champions of Africa playing, this is the team that almost didn’t qualify for the tournament: spontaneous play, absence of any tactic, lack of mentality and tactical discipline, long balls, miss-passes or lack of them at all, sloppy defending, attack built on individual talent…..etc

I remembered all that and I imagined that we were playing in Algeria with more than 50 thousand fans who are extremely enthusiastic and eager not only to beat us but humiliate us and even leave us with some injuries if necessary.

I imagined that with every miss-pass and counter attack, I hear a great roar from the stands that would freak any rookie and players waiting for half a chance to destroy us; with every mistake in the defense, there are players who won’t give us a margin for mistake.

With every stupid tackle and brawl from some players who just can’t control themselves, I see players and fans more than ready to break a fight actually they will be more than happy to do it and with passion.

To give you an idea about how the Algerian fans are eagerly anticipating the game, watch this video

They actually bought a ticket, made the effort to go to the stadium with their flags accompanied by other Maghreb countries flags (sadly though!!) to boo our players; if this how the Algerians living in a country far away from home, how about the Algerian fans in Algeria!!!

Back to the game

Reasons to worry

1-the defense chose lack of concentration and communication at many balls especially through balls coming from the wing and showed high vulnerability in one on one situations against Oman’s players!!!!…..they used harsh physical interventions to get the ball which reflect their helplessness.

2- Ahmed El Mohamady didn’t know whether to attack or defend, failed to connect with midfield player and played individually, failed to send one right cross and most importantly left wide spaces behind him in defense which we can’t afford; we are going to need Ahmed Fathi, Mohamady is good but he just can’t play against Algeria.

3- Sayed Moawad on the other side was better than Mohamady but also failed to connect with his colleagues in many incidents which resulted in the ball being intercepted or ended up as a throw in for the opponent; he did well in dribbling and getting some crosses however he should work to have better connection with midfield players.

4- Hosni Abd Raboh was very nervous, I don’t know why, and because of this he failed for the linkage between defense and attack and was unable to control the tempo like how he did in Ghana.

5- the attacking trio were playing in isolated islands, failed to connect except in one or two balls and failed to position themselves well; I even don’t know what was Amr Zaki doing, he ran everywhere aimlessly!!

6- The coaching from outside the line wasn’t good, Shehata seemed stressed and nervous while he shouldn’t at this time and didn’t do anything to change the mess in the field.

7- The new players are good but they are just new, they have no chemistry with the rest of the team and they don’t have the balls to play in Algeria; cuz we need players who can stand solid in the field.

8- We have a real crisis in midfield; Hosni is out of form, so is Shawky, Ahmed Hassan is too old, Khairy is too young and inexperienced, Abdel Aziz Tawfiq isn’t an international player….hope Shehata would do something about this!!!

Reasons for hope

1- The game was experimental, so having these mistakes identified; we can work on solving although I doubt we have enough time for this.

2- El Hadary was great and managed to keep a clean sheet, if it was anyone but him we would have lost heavily, so this is something to give confidence in Algeria’s game.

3- Hopefully the players realize how bad they were and get things right during Algeria’s game.

4- Mido will return in confederations cup!!!!

here is the goal

you’ve got to love the crash scene!!!

Let’s just try to stay positive and give the players the back-up they need; expect a series of posts building up for the game.