28 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Position 1, 71 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
Emam Ashour 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad12 Apr 2027
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Youssef Belammari 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.
It is not much of a headline and it is the reason players believe the next promise. Al Ahly told Taher Mohamed something would happen and then it happened, which in this industry passes for remarkable.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Nejc Gradišar’s exile
37 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
20 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
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.
17 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
53 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
18 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Squad22 Mar 2027
Mohamed Seha has improved at 25, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
64 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Position 1, 64 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Emam Ashour 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.
Three points for Al Ahly, 2‑0 the final word against Ghazl El Mahalla in a contest settled by the finer margins.
Squad15 Mar 2027
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Youssef Belammari 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.
The words a physio says slowly. 79 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ibrahim El Asyuti will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Emam Ashour 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.
Squad1 Mar 2027
Mohamed Awad 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.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Arab Contractors runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Market1 Mar 2027
Hazem Gamal returns from a loan that gave him nothing
2 appearances and 0 goals is not a season, it is a year somebody has lost. Whether that is his fault, the borrowing club's or the people who arranged it is the argument the next few weeks will have.
The words a physio says slowly. 90 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Marked 8.05 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
98 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
He will play here until the summer and then walk out of the door for free, having already signed elsewhere. Supporters will manage the first part of that sentence; it is the second they will struggle with.
Emam Ashour 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.
“I did not go to Masr El Makasa to sit and watch. I want to come back to Al Ahly and fight for my place.” 0 appearances in 25 matches say the rest.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Mohamed Awad 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.
20 games unbeaten now. Some were earned and some were survived, but a habit is forming — and habits are the hardest thing in football to play against.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Mohamed Hany damages knee ligaments — 106 days out
The words a physio says slowly. 106 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Al Ahly hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Hesham Mostafa will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Al Ahly, and 0 appearances in 26 say he has earned the hearing.
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 was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
114 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
14 home matches unbeaten. Visiting sides arrive already talking about the atmosphere, which is usually the sign that they have half-lost before kickoff.
A defender on the scoresheet, which happens rarely enough that everybody in the ground remembers who took the corner. 1 for him, and a mark of 7.80 for the rest of it.
The offer from Ghazl El Mahalla for Ziad Ayoub 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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ibrahim El Asyuti will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ahly heard it as anything else.
Emam Ashour 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.
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.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at MB Rouissat runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
123 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
A 2‑0 win over Ghazl El Mahalla, a place in the next round, and the quiet arithmetic every supporter does on the walk home: how many more until a final?
13 matches unbeaten here. Every visiting manager is asked about it in the week before, which is precisely why it keeps going.
Player ratings25 Jan 2027
Belal Ateya, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 7.66
A mark of 7.66 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
139 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The offer from Plateau United for Belal Ateya 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.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
16 goals and a season average of 7.23 will do that. The space he used to find has gone; he keeps scoring anyway, which is the mark of the real thing.
Squad11 Jan 2027
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at USM Alger runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
There are footballers who have a good season and footballers a season is remembered for, and the second kind get their names read out in a hall in the summer. Al Ahly will be quietly delighted and privately nervous.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Al Ahly hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mohamed Seha will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
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.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.50, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad28 Dec 2026
Mohamed Seha has improved at 25, which nobody expected
Careers are supposed to plateau and then decline, and the players who ignore that are always the ones who were listening on the training ground. 3 points of it, over months, at an age where the direction normally only goes one way.
Position 1, 36 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ahly heard it as anything else.
10 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Defending was optional and nobody took up the option. 6 goals between Al Ahly and Masr El Makasa, and not one of the people who paid to be there will ask for the money back.
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.
Youssef Belammari 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 performance of 8.35 does not come along often, and when it does the rest of the team becomes scenery. He was magnificent.
Player ratings21 Dec 2026
Mohamed Sherif was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.19. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Dec 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
There is no complaint available here and everybody involved knows it, which does not make the walk to the bench any shorter. Form is the only currency in football that cannot be borrowed against.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
Emam Ashour 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.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 4 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Sherif 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.
The board have answered with money instead of encouragement, which is the only answer a manager ever wants. Spending it well is now entirely his problem.
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marwan Ateya wants continental football; whether Al Ahly can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Squad30 Nov 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
9 without defeat on their own grass. The pitch has not changed; the crowd has — louder earlier, and quicker to sense when the opposition would rather be somewhere else.
Mohamed Ali Ben Romdhane 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.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at ES Ben Aknoun runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
2 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
Emam Ashour 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.
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.
20 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at USM Alger runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
2 in front and in complete control, and it finished with ENPPI the happier side. There is no version of this afternoon that Al Ahly will enjoy reviewing.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 7 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
The clubs have agreed terms, and what remains is formality: a medical, a photograph, a signature. Nobody at Al Ahly is pretending he will be back in the shirt.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Al Ahly hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Emam Ashour 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.
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.
“I watch every Al Ahly game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at MB Rouissat runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mohamed Seha will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Squad2 Nov 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 19 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Position 1, 24 points, and the result everyone checks first is now theirs. The word is still not being said around the ground, which is how you know everyone is thinking it.
3 wins in a row changes how opponents warm up: quieter, more glances across. Runs end, everybody knows that — but nobody in this dressing room is planning for it.
Emam Ashour 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.
Squad26 Oct 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mohamed Sherif 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Al Ahly, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Zidan Nageh is 19, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
Squad19 Oct 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Al Ahly, and 3 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 20 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.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Emam Ashour 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.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Zizo. 3‑2 against Wadi Degla, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Al Ahly, and 0 appearances in 9 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from Afsha’s exile
It is the most legitimate ambition in the sport and the hardest for most clubs to satisfy. Marwan Ateya wants continental football; whether Al Ahly can provide it is a question about the next two seasons, not about him.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 19 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.
“I am grateful for the games, but I did not become a footballer to be somebody else's spare part.” He wants to be at Al Ahly, and 0 appearances in 8 say he has earned the hearing.
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.
Emam Ashour 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.
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.
At 25 the improving is meant to be over. It is not: 3 points better than the mark taken at the start of the year, which is the sort of thing that happens to players who take the boring parts of the job seriously.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mohamed Sherif provided it, and the 8.52 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ahly heard it as anything else.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Hamza Alaa will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Al Ahly the goodbyes have quietly begun.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Al Ahly did not have in the autumn.
Squad21 Sep 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ahly heard it as anything else.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Hussein El Shahat 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.
20 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Youssef Belammari 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.
19 times he got in the way of something. Centre-halves get written about when they make mistakes and ignored when they do not, so an afternoon like this needs saying out loud: he is the reason the scoreline reads as it does.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Emam Ashour was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.22. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The words a physio says slowly. 16 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 8 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
1 for Marwan Ateya, marked 7.66, and a centre-half's name in the part of the report he normally only reaches by mistake. He will not be allowed to forget it in the dressing room for a month.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Al Ahly they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Successful dribbles: 21. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad7 Sep 2026
Words at Al Ahly training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Zizo 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.
The phone has started ringing about Ibrahim El Asyuti again, and this time the name on the line is Arab Contractors. Al Ahly are listening politely and promising nothing.
24 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Mohamed Sherif provided it, and the 8.64 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“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 Al Ahly, and it is not being withdrawn.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Islam Gaber is living that version at Al Ahly, and it tends to show in the first month.
The chase for Islam Gaber ended with $580.0K changing hands and Arab Contractors out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Emam Ashour 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.
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.
31 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Al Ahly lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
The offer from Plateau United for Ahmed Kouka 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.
“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 Al Ahly, 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 Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
The fee is $210.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. El Masry drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
22 defensive actions and a clean sheet at the end of them. A defender's afternoon can only be told by what did not happen, which is why nobody makes a highlights package out of one and every manager in the division would take it.
The phone has started ringing about Taher Mohamed again, and this time the name on the line is Shooting Stars. Al Ahly are listening politely and promising nothing.
Emam Ashour 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.
Boardroom17 Aug 2026
3 academy players handed senior numbers at Al Ahly
The morning the pathway stops being a brochure and becomes a team sheet. Most of them will not be here in three years; all of them have already done the hard part, which was getting to today.
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.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Shikabala Hassan has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
There is no fee, no unveiling and no agent on the steps. Shikabala Trezeguet has been at this club since he was a boy and is now, formally, one of the first-team squad — which for a local readership beats any signing of any size.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Mostafa El Hadary is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Mohamed Awad has just signed for Al Ahly, and for once the answer mattered.
“I have ambitions, and I would like the club to share them.” Nobody has asked to leave and nobody has been shown the door — but a player chooses that sentence carefully, and a boardroom hears it exactly as it was meant.
Emam Ashour 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.
295 appearances across 11 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.
“I want to be playing for trophies while my legs still let me.” Nothing in that sentence is a transfer request, and nobody at Al Ahly heard it as anything else.
The phone has started ringing about Mohamed Zaalouk again, and this time the name on the line is USM Alger. Al Ahly are listening politely and promising nothing.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Al Ahly this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
In brief
SquadWords at Al Ahly training over how hard people work