{"id":22369,"date":"2025-10-07T15:04:06","date_gmt":"2025-10-07T15:04:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=22369"},"modified":"2025-10-07T15:04:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-07T15:04:06","slug":"goal-shy-salah-seeks-change-as-egypt-eye-world-cup-place","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=22369","title":{"rendered":"Goal-shy Salah seeks change as Egypt eye World Cup place"},"content":{"rendered":"
Mohamed Salah wants to put a disappointing start to his season with Liverpool behind him on Wednesday and help Egypt beat Djibouti and qualify for the 2026 World Cup.<\/p>\n

A win for the record seven-time African champions over one of the lowest ranked teams in the continent will give them an unassailable lead over second-placed Burkina Faso in Group A with one match to spare.<\/p>\n

A two-time African Footballer of the Year, Salah has lost his spark with the Premier League champions, scoring just three goals in nine appearances in all competitions this season.<\/p>\n

Last season, the 33-year-old netted 29 times in 38 league matches to win the Golden Boot award as Liverpool surged to a record-equalling 20th Premier League title.<\/p>\n

Salah has fond memories of playing against Djibouti, scoring four goals in a 6-0 Cairo romp in the opening round of World Cup qualifying two years ago.<\/p>\n

It does not help Djibouti that they do not have a FIFA-approved stadium, so their ‘home’ match against Egypt will be staged in the Moroccan commercial capital Casablanca.<\/p>\n

Three subsequent goals took Salah to seven in the qualifying campaign, one less than chart-topper Denis Bouanga of Gabon with two rounds remaining.<\/p>\n

Fellow Egypt forward Mostafa Mohamed, who plays for French Ligue 1 outfit Nantes, is not concerned about Salah, telling reporters the lack of goals is “a temporary setback”.<\/p>\n

“Mo is a big star, and we are lucky to have him in our team. He is the best player in the history of Egypt,” he told the FIFA website.<\/p>\n

“He is amazing. For me, he has a great personality. I love him a lot. He is a wonderful player,” added Mohamed, who also scored against Djibouti.<\/p>\n

Egypt coach Hossam Hassan has an embarrassment of attacking riches, Apart from Salah and Mohamed, he can call on Omar Marmoush, Mahmoud ‘Trezeguet’ Hassan and Ahmed ‘Zizo’ Sayed.<\/p>\n

Given Djibouti have lost seven of eight qualifiers and lie 158 places below Egypt in the FIFA rankings, it would be a shock if they prevent the Pharaohs sealing a fourth World Cup appearance.<\/p>\n

– Algeria set to qualify –<\/p>\n

Algeria and Cape Verde are the other two countries who can clinch places at the World Cup with matchday nine victories, and join already-qualified Morocco and Tunisia in North and Central America next year.<\/p>\n

Senegal, reigning African champions Ivory Coast and Ghana could also take unassailable leads, but they must win and hope other group results favour them.<\/p>\n

Group C, where Benin lead South Africa on goal difference and Nigeria and Rwanda are three points behind, is the one section where a qualifier cannot emerge before the final round, starting on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Like Egypt, Algeria can qualify if they secure maximum points against a much lower ranked opponent. The Desert Foxes have the added advantage of playing an ‘away’ Group G match against Somalia at home.<\/p>\n

Security concerns prevent Somalia staging matches in Mogadishu, and a 163-place rankings gap behind Algeria demonstrates the difficult challenge facing the Ocean Stars in Oran on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Algeria coach Vladimir Petkovic has called up for the first time Luca Zidane, a 27-year-old goalkeeper with Spanish second-tier club Granada and son of French great Zinedine Zidane.<\/p>\n

Luca, who qualifies for Algeria because his paternal grandparents were born there, has switched international allegiance after representing France at youth levels.<\/p>\n

Algeria are seeking a fifth appearance at the global showpiece, while Cape Verde are hoping to qualify for the first time. They face Libya in Tripoli on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

A former Portuguese colony, Cape Verde is a group of islands off the west coast with about 550,000 inhabitants. Qualification would make them the African country with the smallest population to do so.<\/p>\n

Even if the Cape Verdeans fail in Libya, they will get a second chance on Monday to collect three points needed to finish above Cameroon when they host bottom team Eswatini in Group D.<\/p>\n

Ghana will win Group I on Wednesday if they beat the Central African Republic and Madagascar do not collect maximum points against the Comoros.<\/p>\n

Senegal can qualify from Group B if they win in South Sudan on Friday and the Democratic Republic of Congo fail to win in Togo.<\/p>\n

Ivory Coast, who last featured at a World Cup in 2014, would return if they win away to the Seychelles and Gabon lose to the Gambia.<\/p>\n

Failure to win a group does not spell the end of the road, though. The four best-ranked runners-up enter African play-offs in November from which the winners go to intercontinental play-offs in March.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mohamed Salah wants to put a disappointing start to his season with Liverpool behind him on Wednesday and help Egypt beat Djibouti and qualify for the 2026 World Cup. A win for the record seven-time African champions over one of the lowest ranked teams in the continent will give them an unassailable lead over second-placed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22369","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22369","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22369"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22369\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}