“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Masr El Makasa have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
Ask anyone on the way out what separated the sides and you will get one name: Omar Hassan. 1‑0 against Arab Contractors, and the applause at the whistle was mostly his.
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.
Masr El Makasa have made the call to Al Ahly. No fee, a share of the wages, and a spare shirt in the position where the squad has been thinnest all season.
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.
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.
He used to wear the other shirt. On Saturday he plays against Wadi Degla in this one, and whatever he says this week about it being just another game will be untrue.
It has been denied twice and printed three times, which is the usual arithmetic. Until Shikabala Soliman signs something — a contract at Masr El Makasa or anywhere else — this column belongs to him.
Nobody at Masr El Makasa will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
A year in and the language has not come, the city has not opened up, and he eats alone more often than anybody at Masr El Makasa would like to admit. It is showing on Saturdays.
“Thirty minutes, door closed, everything said. We shook hands after.” Whatever was in the room stayed in the room, and Bassem Hamdi trained the next morning like a man with less to carry.
It has stopped being a mood in the stands and started being something organised. Boards can ignore a bad atmosphere for a long time; they cannot ignore this stage of it for very long at all.
“I know what people will say. I know what I want, and it is here.” Wadi Degla had the fee agreed and the shirt ready; they did not have the player, and now they will not.
“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.
Al Ahly have accepted the money. What Masr El Makasa do not yet have is the man, and between here and the photograph is a conversation about wages that both sides are dreading.
Boardroom6 Sep 2032
Deadline passes with 10 signed and 13 gone
That is the business done at Masr El Makasa until the window opens again. Whether it was enough will be answered on Saturdays rather than in a column, and the first Saturday is close.
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.
“The easiest signature of my career.” Ramadan Trezeguet and Masr El Makasa agree another 2 years, and the manager can plan around him rather than about him.
Somebody said out loud what several people thought about how hard another man trains, and Kássio was in the middle of it. The one dressing-room argument that is genuinely about football.
The captaincy has been taken off Mohamed Hassan. Masr El Makasa will call it a decision about the team; a dressing room reads it as a verdict on a man.
“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.
Fee agreed, terms agreed, medical booked. Ahmed Aboutrika will be somebody else’s player by the weekend, and around Masr El Makasa the goodbyes have quietly begun.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Masr El Makasa have done the hard part with Al Ahly, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Squad26 Jul 2032
Words at Masr El Makasa training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Kássio 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.
Nobody at Masr El Makasa will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
Signings arrive with a picture of the club in their head, and this one’s picture was bigger than the building. He will play well and he will be gone, in that order, and everybody knows it.
The dugout16 Feb 2032
The manager’s verdict
“I am not going to get carried away and I will not let them either. It was a good day. There will be harder ones.” Interim Coach kept it short after the 2‑0 win, which is what managers do when they are happy.
In brief
The dugoutAli El Wensh dropped after a run of poor form