9 matches now without a victory, and the excuses have worn thinner than the patience. Somebody at Ismaily has to find a result from somewhere.
Player ratings12 Oct 2026
A brace, and Diego Sánchez takes the afternoon — 9.71
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Diego Sánchez provided it, and the 9.71 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
6 goals. Both benches spent the second half looking at each other rather than at the pitch. Purists will complain about Ismaily and El Dakhleya in equal measure; everybody else had a wonderful time.
8 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
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.
Ahmed Adel 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.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Éric Traoré 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 Ismaily game from here. That says everything about where my head is.” The loan at ES Setif runs its course, but his heart never made the trip.
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.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
18 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.
Éric Traoré 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.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Abdallah Gamal is 23, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
It needed Éric Traoré to find the net to bring anything home at all: 1‑1 against Arab Contractors, and half the dressing room will call it a point won.
18 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ismaily 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad14 Sep 2026
Éric Traoré 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.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
Ali El Malawany was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.00. 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.
7 attempts, none of them in. He got into the right places all afternoon, which is the hard part, and did the easy part badly — and that is the version of a bad day a manager can live with.
27 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Ismaily lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“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 Ismaily, and it is not being withdrawn.
Ahmed Adel 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 Sep 2026
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Éric Traoré 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
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.
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.
“It had gone on long enough. I would rather have it out than leave it sitting there.” Ten minutes behind a closed door at Ismaily, and both men came out saying it was fine.
Marked 5.58. 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.
Ahmed Adel 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.
Squad24 Aug 2026
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Éric Traoré 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 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.
5 shots, and a count that reads like a good afternoon until you check the other column. Strikers survive weeks like this on the understanding that the chances keep arriving; the day they stop is the day it becomes a problem.
This is not cover and nobody is pretending it is. $400.0K has been paid because Diego Sánchez is straightforwardly better than what was already here, and the club has decided to stop waiting.
The phone has started ringing about Fred Emmings again, and this time the name on the line is ES Setif. Ismaily 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
2 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.
The terraces17 Aug 2026
Ismaily spend $400.0K on the signing the town wanted
It is the rarest sequence in football: supporters ask for something, and the club goes and does it. $400.0K for Diego Sánchez, and for one week nobody is complaining about anything.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Mohamed El Hadary is that, and the reception he gets on his first appearance will be different in kind from the one any signing receives.
The academy exists for exactly this morning. Salah El Hadary has come through every age group the club runs and has now been handed a senior number, and the people who coached him at twelve will be the proudest in the building.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Ahmed Adel 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 Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Éric Traoré 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.