Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Masr El Makasa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Mostafa Zizo will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Masr El Makasa the goodbyes have quietly begun.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Trezeguet Salah and Masr El Makasa agree another 2 years.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
A 1‑0 win over Military Production, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
15 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 97 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
Lucas Ferraz Vila 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.
Squad22 Feb 2027
Mostafa Fathy 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 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.
“I watch every Masr El Makasa game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Rangers International runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
In brief
Loan watchThe goals keep arriving from El Sayed Fathy’s exile
Player ratingsAn afternoon Ahmed Mohsen will want back
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Masr El Makasa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ramadan El Wensh will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Masr El Makasa the goodbyes have quietly begun.
Mostafa Fathy 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.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Masr El Makasa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
Terms are settled between the clubs and the rest is paperwork and a photograph. Around Masr El Makasa they have already started talking about him in the past tense.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 24 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
Lucas Ferraz Vila 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.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Mostafa Fathy 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.
Ramadan Elneny is the division's best young player this month
At 20 he has spent a month being better than everybody his age in the league, which is a different and harder thing than one good afternoon. Masr El Makasa will try very hard not to make too much of it.
A clause somebody insisted on years ago, in a negotiation nobody remembers, has just paid Masr El Makasa $250.0K. Omar Trezeguet left a long time ago; the paperwork stayed.
In brief
Player ratingsA defender's afternoon for Mostafa Fathy
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Masr El Makasa will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Masr El Makasa can pretend not to have heard.
Mostafa Fathy 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 Feb 2027
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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.
Brutal, unambiguous and, for all the horror of the moment, usually less career-shaped than the ligament everybody fears more. 127 days, a clean timeline, and a return date somebody can actually plan around.
The terraces25 Jan 2027
The ground has had enough
“We travel everywhere and we get this.” 8 of the 30 senior players heard it walking off, and the ones who did not hear it were not playing.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Masr El Makasa can pretend not to have heard.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
The phone has started ringing about Amr Trezeguet again, and this time the name on the line is Police Union. Masr El Makasa are listening politely and promising nothing.
“I watch every Masr El Makasa game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Rangers International runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
27 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Masr El Makasa lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
At 20 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
55 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Masr El Makasa 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. Trezeguet Salah provided it, and the 9.24 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody 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 Masr El Makasa 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.
8 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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 7.88 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Trezeguet Hamdi 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.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Mostafa Fathy 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.
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Ibrahim Trezeguet and Masr El Makasa agree another 2 years.
13 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
7 signings in three months. Every one of them may be an upgrade and the team can still be worse for a while, which is the part of a rebuild that never appears in the transfer-window verdicts.
“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 Masr El Makasa, and 1 appearances in 13 say he has earned the hearing.
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 6 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Mostafa Fathy 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.
Squad23 Nov 2026
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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 a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Mostafa Zizo 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.
At 33 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.60 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Masr El Makasa are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Mostafa Fathy 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.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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 an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.36 at 33, and nobody on the pitch was better.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
“I did not go to Rangers International to sit and watch. I want to come back to Masr El Makasa and fight for my place.” 1 appearances in 9 matches say the rest.
A 2‑2 draw with Smouha leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
Squad2 Nov 2026
A place in the month's best eleven for Hossam Sobhi
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Hossam Sobhi has come out of that comparison in the side, and Masr El Makasa have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 22-year-old it feels ownership of. Walid Zizo 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.
Marked 5.44. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
Mostafa Fathy 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.
21 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.
Squad12 Oct 2026
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Masr El Makasa, another week without a signature from Ahmed Mohsen.
Squad12 Oct 2026
9 new faces, and Masr El Makasa are still learning each other
A squad rebuilt inside one window pays for it in a currency nobody budgets for. The football is not worse than the sum of the players; it is worse than the sum of the players who have played together before.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Mostafa Fathy 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 Masr El Makasa game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at Rangers International runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
Marked 5.55. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.32 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Mostafa Fathy 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Daouda Doumbia 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.
Aswan held the lead for 1 minutes, which is not long enough to enjoy it. Masr El Makasa answered before the celebration had properly finished, and the shape of the afternoon changed with it.
It is never announced and it is entirely visible: the biggest afternoons of the season keep containing him. A press box works this out long before anybody at the club confirms a word of it.
Marked 5.59. Nothing he attempted worked and by the hour mark he had stopped attempting much, which is the part a manager notices rather than the mistakes.
32 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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Masr El Makasa 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.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 3 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
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.
Footballers are asked about their boyhood club so often that nobody listens to the answer. Daouda Doumbia has just signed for Masr El Makasa, and for once the answer mattered.
The terraces7 Sep 2026
The boos come down from three sides
“We pay for this every fortnight. The least we want is somebody who looks like he cares.” 6 of the 25 senior players walked off into it; the rest were not playing.
“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 Masr El Makasa, 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 Masr El Makasa 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.
“We keep meeting, and we keep leaving the room with the same numbers we walked in with.” Another round of talks at Masr El Makasa, another week without a signature from Daouda Doumbia.