Waving flags, singing patriotic songs and carrying banners proclaiming “Egypt’s men made us proud”, thousands of supporters welcomed Egypt’s national football team home \u200bon Friday after the Pharaohs produced the finest World Cup campaign in \u200cthe country’s history.<\/p>\n
Crowds gathered outside Alamein International Airport on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast to greet the players and coaching staff after their return from North America, where Egypt won at the World \u200bCup for the first time in four attempts and reached the last \u200b16. Fans also held pictures of captain Mohamed Salah bearing the \u2060words “Thank you”.<\/p>\n
The celebrations continued as the squad boarded an open-top bus and paraded \u200bthrough New Alamein, waving to cheering supporters lining the streets. President Abdel Fattah \u200bal-Sisi is due to receive the team and its technical and administrative staff on Saturday.
\nAmong the crowds were supporters carrying large posters of coach Hossam Hassan draped in a Palestinian flag, \u200breflecting appreciation for his support of the Palestinian cause during the tournament. Egypt’s all-time \u200bleading scorer carried a Palestinian flag on the pitch on several occasions and voiced support for \u200cPalestinian \u2060rights during press conferences.<\/p>\n
The homecoming came despite a heartbreaking 3-2 defeat by Lionel Messi’s Argentina in the last 16. Egypt led 2-0 until the closing stages before conceding three goals in the final 11 minutes, but still returned home with pride \u200bafter its best-ever World \u200bCup run, having \u2060beaten New Zealand in the group stage and Australia on penalties in the round of 32.<\/p>\n
Before the team’s return, the \u200bEgyptian Football Association renewed the contracts of Hossam Hassan and his \u200btwin brother \u2060Ibrahim Hassan. The federation did not disclose the length of the deal, though local media reported it would run until 2030. Hassan, 59, has revitalised the national side \u2060since \u200btaking charge in 2024, leading Egypt to the \u200b2025 Africa Cup of Nations semi-finals, ending an eight-year World Cup absence and compiling a record of \u200b20 wins, nine draws and six defeats.<\/p>\n
\u2014Reuters\u2014<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":37133,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-39295","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The \u200bEgyptian Football Association renewed the contracts of Hossam Hassan and his \u200btwin brother \u2060Ibrahim Hassan.","published_date":"","news_description":"The \u200bEgyptian Football Association renewed the contracts of Hossam Hassan and his \u200btwin brother \u2060Ibrahim Hassan.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/39295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/39295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39296,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/39295\/revisions\/39296"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=39295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}