File Photo: Egypt's Ramadan Sobhi celebrates scoring their second goal. REUTERS
Egypt’s U-23 national team skipper Ramadan Sobhi stressed on respecting counterparts in Group C of the Olympic football tournament, revealing that the team have their eyes focused on achieving positive results.
Egypt qualified for the Tokyo Olympic Games after winning the Africa U-23 Cup of Nations. The draw put the young Pharaohs in Group C alongside Argentina, Australia, and Spain.
“This is a difficult period. The group have been working hard together for nearly three and half years to get to this point, even the players who will not be present at the Olympics, I want to thank them for what they achieved. But at the end of the day, the technical staff are obligated with a particular number of players,” Sobhi told On Time Sports.
“We’re all focused on achieving positive results and we are now in a closed camp. We’re aware that our group is not easy at all and is very different from the AFCON, where we were playing at home, but now we will play abroad with a big time difference against tough teams.
“The first game is always hard, and Spain’s game will be extremely hard as their squad list includes six players who have been playing at the recent 2020 Euro,” Ramadan added.
The Egyptians will begin their mission by facing Spain on 22 July, then Argentina on 25 July. The third group stage match will be against Australia on 28 July.
“We will do our best. We will face tough squads but we need to have the confidence that we can do the best and achieve good results,” the Pyramids FC winger concluded.
The Olympic football coach Shawqi Gharib announced earlier that Ahmed Hegazi, Mohamed El-Shennawi, and Mahmoud "El-Wensh" Hamdi will join the team as the three senior players.
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