Half-time
The dark was better
By
Inas Mazhar
Despite one of Egypt's worst football defeats in its history, the federation seems to be in denial. It has hardly mentioned last week's 5-0 drubbing against France in Paris, describing the game as a friendly and in effect not worth getting so upset about.
Continuing, it said in not so many words that it was not the end of the world to lose any number of friendly games because they are meant to be warm-ups, in this case part of the team's preparations for the African Nations Cup qualifications.
The federation added that in spite of the defeat there were countries, including powerhouses Argentina, England and world champions Brazil, which have requested to play against Egypt.
In conclusion, the board did not consider the game a disgrace nor did it view the result as shameful.
But in truth it should have. Before game time, few Frenchmen or anybody else in Europe knew much about Egyptian football. Now they do and how we now wish they had remained in the dark.
Prior to the match, only a real Egyptian optimist would have dared believe Egypt would win. We were playing the second best country in the world, the World Cup champions of 1998 and the defending European and Confederation title holders.
With those kind of numbers, we were supposed to lose -- but by a goal or two. And we were supposed to play something called soccer. We never came remotely close.
We were also supposed to show the good side of African soccer. France is still smarting from being beaten by Senegal in the opener of last year's World Cup in Japan and South Korea. But there is no doubt the French also held Senegal in the highest respect for pulling off such a feat. The French players were probably expecting to see something akin to Senegal when we played them; Egypt is a four-time African champion. But that night, Egypt did not look a thing like Senegal or a champion.
Five to nothing means there was no defence at all, no discipline, no harmony and no tactics. As a matter of fact, there was nothing to report, something which did not go unnoticed by the French substitutes on the bench who were time and again caught by the cameras having the time of their lives, so easy was Egypt to score against.
The federation does not want to dwell too much on the match and for good reason. The result has galvanised the Egyptian football viewing public to vehemently protest against the coach and players. Since the match, Coach Mohsen Saleh has come under fierce attack in the press. Saleh is blamed for selecting too many European-based players who either play in inferior leagues or heat up the substitutes bench if they are on a good club, or simply don't give their all when wearing Egypt's jersey.
It would be impossible to change Saleh now even if the federation wanted to. There are two decisive encounters with Mauritius and Madagascar coming up that will decide whether we go to Tunisia in 2004 for the African championships.
The federation, instead, wants to keep Saleh, giving him a vote of confidence after the French debacle but should that confidence extend to the team as well? To let the matter pass and forget the match ever took place will not do. You learn from your mistakes and we made mistakes by the dozen in Paris.
