The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ben Ahmed Kohili did not need any: 8.27, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
There is an age at which every good afternoon gets described as a throwback, which is unfair and also accurate. 8.08 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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
8.86. 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.
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.
Beaten 2‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad2 Nov 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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Four or five weekends of consistency, judged against everybody in the division doing his job. Ben Ahmed Kohili has come out of that comparison in the side, and Ismaily have had the benefit of every one of those afternoons.
90 minutes played. Ben Ahmed Kohili found the finish in time that only existed because of earlier delays, and Police Union went from a point to nothing inside one movement.
10 points, and a fixture list that is running out. The mathematics are not yet cruel, but they are no longer kind.
Player ratings26 Oct 2026
Ben Ahmed Kohili, 21, plays like he has been here for years — 8.30
A mark of 8.30 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 21-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 Ismaily this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad26 Oct 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.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 23-year-old it feels ownership of. Khaled Al-Nabris 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.
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.
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.
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.
5 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.
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.
Ben Ahmed Kohili, 21, 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 21-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
Form comes and goes; this has not gone. Ben Ahmed Kohili is 21, and the version of him training now would not have got into the side he was in a year ago.
4 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.
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.
There is a figure at which a wage bill stops being ambitious and becomes the reason nothing else is possible, and this club has reached it. Nothing is left over for a transfer, a stand or a rainy afternoon.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.75, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad5 Oct 2026
Words at Ismaily training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Ahmed Ayman 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 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.
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 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.
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.
At 23 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.
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.
Marked 8.60 — 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.
Two goals and a mark of 8.68 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
“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.
Every club in football pays most of what it earns to its players. Paying nearly all of it is a different arrangement, and it has ended the same way every time somebody has tried it.
Nobody will confirm this and nothing else explains the last month of selections. A costly error buys a player a period of being second choice that is always longer than the error was.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Ben Ahmed Kohili did not need any: 8.13, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
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.
The injury that keeps coming back, keeps being rushed back from, and quietly costs more careers than the dramatic ones. 14 days is the estimate; the honest figure depends on whether anybody is patient.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Ben Ahmed Kohili 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.
The fee is $190.0K, the contract is signed, and the argument about whether he is worth it can begin. Arab Contractors drove a hard bargain; time will say who won it.
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.
The name of Hassan Saber has come up in conversations Ismaily were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
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.
A brace, and Éric Traoré takes the afternoon — 8.92
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Éric Traoré provided it, and the 8.92 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.
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.
Clubs spend fortunes looking for players and occasionally find one down the corridor. Walid Kahraba 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 Hegazi 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.
Player ratings17 Aug 2026
Ali El Malawany was on a different afternoon to everybody else
8.11. 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.
Conceding is one thing; the response is what tells you about a dressing room. Éric Traoré had Ismaily level again within 4 minutes, and Smouha never got to play with a lead at all.
A defender's mistake gets tidied up by somebody else; a goalkeeper's ends up in the net. He knew before the ball crossed the line, and so did everybody in the ground.
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.
Nobody makes a documentary about a hamstring and everybody in the game fears one. Ismaily will be careful with the return date, because the second one is always worse than the first.
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.
In brief
SquadWords at Ismaily training over how hard people work