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Zamalek won the 15th league title in its history
With the start of the Egyptian league season, no one would have imagined that today, Wednesday, the end would be in this scenario.
Tonight, Zamalek won the Egyptian league title for the fifteenth time in their historyAfter defeating Ceramica Cleopatra with a clean sheet.
In the title race, Zamalek defeated arch-rivals Al-Ahly, who came third in a surprise finish, as well as second-placed Pyramids.
According to this agreement, Zamalek and Pyramids will play in the African Champions League, and Al-Ahly will participate in the Confederation Cup.
High expectations for Al-Ahly and Pyramids before the start of the season
Ahead of the start of the season, which ended today, Wednesday, expectations were high, especially for Al-Ahli, who entered the season with a star-studded squad and a clear moral superiority over their rivals, especially Zamalek.
Al-Ahly managed to land Zizou, Zamalek’s top star of previous seasons, in a fiery deal for the Reds.
The Pyramids were also at the height of their glory, having previously won the African Champions League, the African Super Cup and the Three Confederations Cup.
The nominations involved a repeat of last season’s scenario, when Al-Ahly and Pyramids fought for the title won by the Red Team.
As for Zamalek, they went into the season with a new experience with sporting director John Edward bringing in a number of local and foreign players, but no big name deals, which eventually led to Al-Abyad’s drop from the list of title contenders.
At the beginning of the season, the results were mixed, and none of them were able to impose their dominance over the lead that Ceramica held in the first weeks of the competition.
After that, the trio began their climb to the top, which Zamalek held for a while before a slump in results saw Belgian Yannick Ferreira sacked and Ahmed Abdel Rauf take charge for a time before being replaced by Motamed Gamal.
Zamalek is mired in a series of administrative disasters
Zamalek, which started the season with clear technical problems, suffered a painful blow on October 6 with the withdrawal of the club’s branch plot in City, a project the club had hoped would bring financial resources.
Zamalek was caught in a whirlwind of financial crisis that led to a backlog of cases with FIFA and some players, such as Moroccan Salah Mossadeq, having their contracts terminated.
Sanctions were imposed by FIFA amid the management’s utter inability to deal with a financial crisis that led the club to sell its star players to spend on the squad.
Last January, Zamalek sold their star and playmaker Nasser Maher to rivals Pyramids and also let go of their star midfielder Dunga to earn money to pay the wages of the team’s current players, leaving the team without a huge force in midfield.
On the other hand, stability was evident in Al-Ahly and Burgers, even if the red team experienced a major crisis.
In the past months, many reports have emerged from the big club confirming that there is a serious crisis in the dressing room due to the money Zizou has received.
Reports confirm that Imam Ashour is very angry and wants to amend his contract to be on par with Zizou and Trezeguet, and that the prolific player is considering leaving if his demands are not met.
Zamalek live up to Johan Cruyff’s announcement
With this plain view, Zamalek fans themselves were not optimistic about challenging for the Premier League title this season.
But what happened could be described as a miracle, as a team mired in financial and technical crises and relying on an almost fixed squad, given the lack of big names on the roster, was the title winner.
It is also surprising that Egypt’s most expensive team, Al-Ahly, finished third, while Pyramids came in second.
To clarify, Al-Ahly’s list is the most expensive in the Egyptian league with a market value of €33.93 million, followed by Pyramids at €24.45 million, while Zamalek has a normal value of €16.93 million, almost half of Al Ahly’s value.
What happened confirms that winning and winning titles does not depend only on money, which no one denies its role in sports, but it is not the main factor of victories.
This is reminiscent of the famous saying of “Barcelona” legend, Dutchman Johan Cruyff. “I’ve never seen a moneybag score a goal.”
This adage came true in the Egyptian league this season, as the team with the lowest market value and drowning in a sea of technical and administrative crises won the title, beating two teams that had almost everything in terms of financial and administrative stability and major stars.
