“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ENPPI, and it is not being withdrawn.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ENPPI this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
Clubs make promises constantly and the page usually only hears about them when they are broken. This one was honoured, and the dressing room noticed that faster than any supporter did.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Youssef Labib is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Ahmed Sabeha was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohab Samy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Mohab Samy has come out of that comparison in the side, and ENPPI have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ENPPI this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Rafik Kabou was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohab Samy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
In brief
SquadA place in the month's best eleven for Arafat Masoud
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 21 he is doing things at this level he could not do at the start of the season, and the coaching staff will tell you exactly which of them.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ENPPI this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 19-year-old it feels ownership of. Arafat Masoud has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Kahraba. 1‑0 against Military Production, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Aqtay Abdallah will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around ENPPI the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Rafik Kabou was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Hamed Abdallah has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
The one version of being left out a player cannot argue with, and the one he takes worst. Somebody else has been better and the team sheet says so, in public, every week until it changes.
The shape wanted a different profile against this opponent, which is a real football answer and no comfort at all to the man it is about. He did nothing wrong and he did not play.
In brief
Player ratingsOff the bench and decisive: Mostafa Aref
Player ratingsAhmed Kalosha spends the afternoon fouling
The deal that would have taken Aqtay Abdallah to El Dakhleya has collapsed at the last stage, and he reports back to ENPPI with a summer to forget and a season still to play. Nobody is saying which side walked away.
Rafik Kabou was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Kahraba is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ENPPI, and it is not being withdrawn.
The offer from US Forces Armees for Hossam Ghanem was heard out and sent back the same day. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loudly the door closes.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ENPPI this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ENPPI, and it is not being withdrawn.
Rafik Kabou was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
“Nobody here is above being told.” It was not said with a name attached, but the dressing room can count, and so can everybody who was listening.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Emad Mayhoub falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It is a small honour and it is not nothing: somebody watched every match in the division and decided that Rafik Kabou was the best thing in any of them.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 88th, and Aswan spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at ENPPI, and it is not being withdrawn.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.33 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $450.0K has been paid because Mohamed El Araby is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at ENPPI this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
4 boys move up, and somewhere in the building the people who coached them at twelve are quietly having the best morning of their working year. Nothing about this shows up in a result and it is why the academy exists.
Three points for ENPPI, 3‑2 the final word against Aswan in a contest settled by the finer margins.
The terraces17 Aug 2026
ENPPI spend $450.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $450.0K for Mohamed El Araby, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what ENPPI can pretend not to have heard.
270 appearances across 8 seasons in one shirt. Nobody builds a career like that on purpose any more; it happens to a certain kind of footballer at a certain kind of club.
Rafik Kabou was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Emad Mayhoub falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.