Marked for Bassem El Wensh
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Successful dribbles: 31. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Squad28 Dec 2026
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.
Match26 Dec 2026
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Abdallah Hassan. 2‑1 against El Dakhleya, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
Player ratings28 Dec 2026
Marked 8.13 — 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.
Squad28 Dec 2026
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Masr El Makasa, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Squad28 Dec 2026
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.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match5 Dec 2026
The run now stands at 5, and the questions being asked around Masr El Makasa are no longer polite ones.
Squad7 Dec 2026
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.
Squad7 Dec 2026
“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.
Match5 Dec 2026
Beaten 0‑1, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad7 Dec 2026
Bassem El Wensh named in the team of the month
A month is long enough that nobody gets in by accident. Bassem El Wensh is in the division's best eleven for it, which is a quieter compliment than an award and a more reliable one.
Squad7 Dec 2026
The plan did not have a place for Mahmoud Ezzat
Nobody at Masr El Makasa is suggesting he is out of form. The manager simply wanted somebody with a different set of qualities for ninety specific minutes, and there is nothing a player can train to fix that.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Player ratings16 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 32. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad16 Nov 2026
Hossam El Hadary 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.
Squad16 Nov 2026
“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.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Successful dribbles: 28. There is a particular sort of despair on a full-back's face by the seventieth minute, and it was on display.
Squad9 Nov 2026
Mahmoud Mohsen 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
“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.
Player ratings9 Nov 2026
Ninety minutes of El Sayed Sobhi at his very best
Marked 8.11. Players have careers without a single afternoon like this in them, and he has just had one in front of everybody at Masr El Makasa.
Squad9 Nov 2026
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Bassem El Wensh trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Successful dribbles: 33. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Player ratings28 Sep 2026
Bassem El Wensh, 20, plays like he has been here for years — 7.93
A mark of 7.93 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 20-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Salah Trezeguet is a better footballer than he was
Not a run of form — an actual step up, held for months. At 23 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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
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.
Squad28 Sep 2026
Abdallah Hassan 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.
The terraces28 Sep 2026
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.
From our football correspondent
Uneasy
Player ratings31 Aug 2026
Successful dribbles: 41. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Market31 Aug 2026
$91.0K. Fees like that buy a footballer and rent a debate: every touch will be measured against the number for a season at least.
Market31 Aug 2026
The bid was some way short and Masr El Makasa did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Market31 Aug 2026
“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.
Market31 Aug 2026
Add another name to the list: Zira have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Mostafa El Hadary. The answer from Masr El Makasa has not changed — yet.
Squad31 Aug 2026
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 terraces31 Aug 2026
Masr El Makasa spend $91.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $91.0K for Abdoulaye Diabaté, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Squad31 Aug 2026
The manager makes an example of Mahmoud Ezzat
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Match29 Aug 2026
A 1‑1 draw with El Dakhleya leaves the dressing room somewhere between relief and regret.
From our football correspondent
Steady
Market3 Aug 2026
The bid was some way short and Masr El Makasa did not need long over it. Nobody in the game reads a first refusal as the end of anything.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Hossam El Hadary 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
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Abdallah Hassan 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.
Market3 Aug 2026
The phone has started ringing about Mohamed Ashour again, and this time the name on the line is Aswan. Masr El Makasa are listening politely and promising nothing.
Squad3 Aug 2026
“Some decisions take a long time. This one took ten minutes, and most of that was finding a pen.” Mahmoud Marwan and Masr El Makasa agree another 1 years.
Squad3 Aug 2026
Emad El Nenny knocks on the manager’s door
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Emad El Nenny trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.