Shehata chooses his squad for the qualifiers

so, yesterday hassan shehata announced the names of players he chose to join the training camp in Cairo to start preparations for the qualifiers. he choose 30 players to pick from them only 23 players who are actually going to play. the roster witnessed new faces and old faces who are back and also ignored some players. also the team schedule has been announced so every body get ready

a lot of things have changed since Ghana 2008, some players became out of form, some went to Europe and some players who weren’t there shined greatly to the limit that they can’t be ignored, new faces showed what they can offer and some were injured. even the fans have changed, after celebrating with the team after Ghana now they are booing and jeering some players (el hadary) !!!!!

that’s why this list has sparked controversy all over this month in news papers and among followers. everyone was predicting while the only man who will actually choose remained silent.

here is the list:

goal keepers: el hadary (fc sion), abd el monsef (zamalek), mohamed sobhy (ismaily), amir abd el hamid (ahly)

attackers: abu trika (ahly), emad meteb (ahly), amr zaki (zamalek), mohamed fadl (ismaily), mohamed zidan (hamburg), ahmed eid (haras el hdoud), ahmed raouf (enppi), shikabala (zamalek)

so we now have 7 new faces who are joining the national team for the first time: mohamed ibrahim, ahmed raouf, amir abd el hamid , islam awad, ahmed samir farag, mohamed abd el shafy and hani said from haras el hdoud. some of these players showed high performances in the league and forced themselves in shehata’s consideration however some of them will say good bye for one reason, they are very young and lack international experience.

the list ignored: shady mohamed, omar gamal, sayed moawad, ibrahim said (both busy looking for a club to settle in next year) and gamal hamza who is in a really great form these days but it seems that it is sth personal between him and shehata!!!

others are absent because of injury like ahmed fathy, mohamed shawky and MIDO.

the one big new addition to the team is shikabala (pictured), if you like zidan’s talent so you will definetly love shikabala if you don’t know what i am talking about take a look:

the team’s agenda

20-26 may: open camp in Cairo
26-30 may: closed camp in Alexandria
1/6: egypt vs Congo (Cairo stadium)
7/6: Djibouti vs Egypt
14/6: Malawi vs Egypt
22/6: Egypt vs Malawi (Cairo stadium)

so now, we have a deadly attack, a good midfield, an experienced defense and of course the best goal keeper in Africa…….what else do we need to achieve our biggest dream?!