Olympic Team and Number of Participants 13th – Hassan Al-Mestakawi

** This is the 13th time that the Egyptian Olympic team has participated in a football tournament, the first one being at the Antwerp Championship in 1920 and the last one being at the Tokyo Championship in 2020. In these tournaments, the Olympic team finished fourth twice. The first time was in Amsterdam in 1928 and the second time was in Tokyo in 1964. During this participation, the team played 6 games and achieved good results in terms of the number of goals. The Olympic team was eliminated in the first round in five games.
** Rogero Mikalai, head coach of the Brazilian Olympic team, promised to do everything to reach the farthest point of the Olympics. According to Mikalai, perhaps the Egyptian national team ranked third. Before the group draw, four teams in each group played, and the 16 teams were divided into four levels, with one team in each level. The classification system is based on the total points obtained in the men’s football matches of the last five Olympic Games held in 2020, with 3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, and no points for a loss, 2016, 2012, 2008 and 2004.
** The Olympic teams announced by FIFA enter the third level, and the draw is direct, prohibiting two teams from the same continent from being grouped together. In the first round of the competition held in March last year at the Le Paul Mansion in the suburb of Saint-Denis, the French capital Paris announced that the Egyptian national team was in the third group with the Dominican Republic, Spain and Uzbekistan. The champions and runners-up of each group will qualify for the quarter-finals, which will be held from July 24 to August 9 in Paris, Marseille, Saint-Etienne, Lyon, Nantes, Nice, and Bordeaux.
** Today, the Olympic team played their first match against the Dominican Republic, and it was assumed that the Olympic team was better, especially since the Dominican Republic is ranked 150th in FIFA, which reflects the level of the Olympic team. The match was average, and the Dominican Republic was ranked fourth when the draw was made. Fortunately, this was the first match before the Olympic team played against Uzbekistan on July 27 and Spain on July 30, and if the goal is indeed to qualify, then winning both games is a necessary step before facing Spain. After the golden period after the 2014 European Cup. La Fonte led the Spanish Olympic team to a silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
** The Olympic team includes stars Mohamed Elneny and Zidane. The list announced by Micali is: Goalkeepers: Hamza Alaa, Ali Al Jabri, Mohamed Siha.
Defence: Mohammad Tariq, Hossam Abdul Majid, Ahmed Eide, Mohammad Hamdi, Omar Fayed, Karim Dabis.
Midfielders: Mohamed Elneny, Mahmoud Saber, Mohamed Shehata, Ziad Kamel, Ahmed Khatta, Ali Zaza, Mahmoud Jihad, Ahmed Nabil Kouka.
Attacking line: Ibrahim Adel, Osama Faisal, Mustafa Saad Messi, Bilal Mazar, Ahmed Said Zizou.
** Football was considered the strongest sport at the beginning of the Olympics, and this continued until FIFA organized the World Cup in Uruguay in 1930, which was chosen to host the first World Cup because it won the 1924 and 1928 championships. The participation of the Olympic team added special meaning to the football competition. I wish the Olympic team all the best in its 13th participation.